J  2.  .  //,    X  2. 


Jffrnm  tip  ICtbrarg  nf 

ProfrfiHnr  Sntjamtn  Smktnrftg?  JiarfWft 

M?qxxmttyb  btf  Ijtm  to 

tlj?  SItbrarg  nf 

PrmretDtt  atywlngtral  ^mtnarg 

BR  121  .H2  1912 

Haldeman,  Isaac  Massey,  184 

-1933. 
Christ,  Christianity  and  th 


Christ  Christianity 
an&  tbe  Bible 


j    by 

I.  M.  HALDEMAN,  D.D. 

Pastor  First  Baptist  Church,  New  York  City 

Author  of 

How  to  Study  the  Bible,  The  Coming  of  Christ,  The  Signs  of 

the  Times,  Christian  Science  in  the  Light 

of  Holy  Scripture,  etc.,  etc. 


NEW  YORK 

CHARLES    C.    COOK 

150  Nassau  Street 


Copyright,  1912, 
By  Charles  C.   Cook 


CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Cheist         5 

Christianity 47 

The  Bible 92 


Christ 

IF  NOT  GOD— NOT  GOOD 

BY  I.  M.  HALDEMAN,  D.D. 

"Why  callest  thou  me  good?  there  is  none  good  but  one,  that  is 
God"   (Matthew  9:  17). 

^^^^^  HE  world  lias  accepted  Jesus  Christ  as 
m      ^|   a  good  man. 

%.  J   The  evidences  of  his  goodness  are  inan- 

^^^    ifold. 

He  was  full  of  compassion. 

He  never  looked  upon  the  people  as  a  crowd. 
He  never  thought  of  them  as  a  mass.  He  saw 
them  always  as  individuals.  His  heart  went  out 
to  them.  All  his  impulses  were  to  pity  them,  sym- 
pathize with,  and  help  them. 

He  went  among  them.  He  entered  into  all  con- 
ditions, accepted  all  situations.  He  was  present 
at  a  wedding,  he  ate  with  publicans  and  sinners 
and,  anon,  was  guest  at  a  rich  man's  table. 

He  saw  the  ravages  of  disease,  the  shame  of  sin, 
the  tragedies  in  life. 

He  knew  there  was  torture  in  body  and  anguish 
in  spirit. 

He  took  the  mystery  of  pain  and  laid  it  upon 
his  heart,  until  tears  were  his  meat  and  his  drink, 
by  day  and  by  night.  He  became  a  man  of  sor- 
rows and  an  expert  in  grief.    He  took  upon  him 

5 


6         Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

the  woes  of  the  world  till  he  was  bowed  and  bent, 
as  with  the  weight  of  years.  The  tears  of  sym- 
pathy grooved  his  cheeks,  as  when  streams  carve 
their  way  down  mountain  sides.  Because  of  this 
men  looked  at  him  and  saw  neither  form  nor 
comeliness ;  neither  was  there  any  beauty  in  him 
that  they  should  desire  him. 

He  was  a  beneficent  man. 

Multitudes  of  men  are  benevolent,  but  not  be- 
neficent. 

Benevolence  is  well  wishing.  Beneficence  is  well 
doing.  He  was  always  well  doing,  giving  sight  to 
the  blind,  healing  the  sick,  cleansing  the  leper, 
feeding  the  hungry,  raising  the  dead,  unloosing 
the  bonds  of  Satan — unwinding  the  serpent's  coil. 

He  was  absolutely  unselfish. 

He  emptied  himself  and  made  room  in  his  soul 
for  other  lives.  He  had  no  office  hours  and  never 
interposed  secretaries  or  major-domos  between 
himself  and  the  people.  He  received  all  who  came 
unto  him — ministering  without  money  and  without 
price. 

There  is  one  scene  that  might  well  be  painted 
by  a  master  hand. 

It  is  evening.  The  western  sky  is  all  aglow 
with  the  glory  of  the  setting  sun.  Far  up  in  the 
dome  of  the  infinite  blue,  the  evening  star  swings 
golden,  like  a  slow  descending  lamp  let  down  by 
invisible  hands.  The  street  is  in  half-tone.  It  is 
packed  by  the  strangest  of  throngs,  by  the  blind, 
the  lame,  the  halt,  the  paralyzed  and  the  leper — 


Cheist  7 

derelicts  of  humanity — borne  thither  on  a  surging 
tide  of  life  in  which  every  wave  is  an  accent  of 
pain ;  they  are  driven  and  piled  up  in  great,  quiv- 
ering heaps  against  a  door  which  is  partly  shut, 
as  in  self-defence,  by  the  sweltering  crowd  within. 

Jesus  of  Nazareth  is  in  that  house. 

He  is  healing  the  sick.  He  is  giving  health,  and 
strength,  and  peace  to  all  who  seek  him.  He  turns 
no  one  away.  Compassion,  sympathy,  beneficence, 
the  tenderness  of  a  mother  for  her  helpless  babe — ■ 
these  are  the  characteristics  which  his  daily  min- 
istry revealed. 

No  one  ever  brought  a  charge  of  evil  doing  or  evil 
speaking  against  him. 

The  people  who  followed  him  said,  "He  hath 
done  all  things  well." 

Police  officers  sent  to  arrest  him  as  a  disturber 
of  the  peace  found  him  in  the  midst  of  the  people, 
speaking  words  that  hushed  their  tumult,  quieted 
their  murmurings  and  gave  them  rest;  and  the 
officers  returning  to  them  who  sent  them,  said, 
"Never  man  spake  like  this  man." 

Pilate's  wife  dreamed  a  troubled  dream  of  him, 
and  sent  word  to  her  husband  not  to  lay  hands 
on  him — seeing  that  he  was  a  just  man.  Thrice 
before  heaven  and  earth — in  a  testimony  that  still 
echoes  through  infinite  spaces,  and  is  heard  by 
listening  worlds — Pilate  himself  proclaimed,  "I 
find  no  fault  in  this  man. ' ' 

He  lifted  up  his  voice  against  sin  and  un- 
righteousness. 


8        Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

Against  nothing  did  lie  so  much  speak  as  against 
religions  hypocrisy.  Nowhere,  in  any  record,  is 
language  so  terrible,  so  penetrating,  so  hot,  so 
full  of  the  flame  of  fire  and  scorching  analysis, 
scorching  and  burning  in  its  denunciation  of  those 
who  on  the  outside  (in  their  religious  profession) 
were  like  whitened  sepulchres,  but  on  the  inside 
(in  their  actual  lives)  were  full  of  dead  men's 
bones  and  corruption — nowhere,  outside  the 
twenty-third  chapter  of  Matthew,  does  language 
fall  with  such  tremendous  vibration  of  thunderous 
indignation,  and  the  accent  of  aroused  and  fully 
angered  justice.  "Ye  serpents,' '  "ye  generation 
of  vipers,' '  are  some  of  the  phrases;  and  the 
words,  "fools,"  "blind  hypocrites,"  mingle  again 
and  again  with  the  far- sounding,  judicial  menace, 
"Woe,  woe  unto  you." 

He  seemed  to  be  dominated  and  controlled  by 
one  idea — the  idea  of  God.  The  God  thought  held 
and  moved  him.  He  could  not  go  anywhere,  or 
see  anything,  or  utter  the  shortest  discourse,  that 
he  did  not,  in  some  fashion,  connect  it  with  the 
infinite  Father.  Was  a  sower  sowing  seed,  he  saw 
in  that  incident  an  illustration  of  the  fact  that 
the  true  seed  is  the  Word  of  God,  and  the  true 
sower  he  who  casts  it  into  the  mightier  ground 
of  the  human  heart.  Did  a  flock  of  sheep  lie  at 
rest  upon  the  hillside,  guarded  by  a  shepherd's 
care,  at  once  he  would  unfold  the  shepherding  of 
a  Father's  love.  A  tiny  sparrow,  flying  an  un- 
noticed speck  in  the  distant  sky,  or  falling  ground- 


Christ  9 

ward  with  its  weary  flight,  was  a  winged  witness 
that  the  Father  knew  and  saw  even  the  smallest 
details  of  human  life.  A  lily  in  its  lowliness,  and 
yet  a  lily  in  its  beanty  shaming  a  king's  array,  a 
lily,  toiling  not,  but  upward  growing,  furnished 
him  a  text  from  which  to  preach  the  providence 
of  God;  and  a  wandering  beggar  boy  far  away 
from  home  and  kindred,  stained  with  sin  and  dark 
with  sorrow,  gave  occasion  for  the  wondrous  story 
of  the  Prodigal  Son  and  a  father's  changeless  and 
tender  love. 

God!  God!  God!  this  was  the  supreme  note  of 
his  life. 

On  the  cross  he  gave  utterance  to  words  which 
reveal  the  inner  character  of  his  soul. 

When  a  man  has  been  lied  about,  falsified,  his 
good  evil  spoken  of  and  his  reputation  assailed 
(as  was  his  before  the  Sanhedrin — in  the  mock 
trial  given  him  there),  when  such  a  man  has  been 
hounded  from  one  end  of  the  town  to  the  other, 
spit  upon  and  jibed  at  and,  finally,  nailed  through 
hands  and  feet  to  a  torturing  cross ;  when  such  a 
man  with  his  heart  bursting  (because  of  the  im- 
peded circulation,  driving  the  surging,  tumultuous 
blood  back  upon  it),  with  the  sun  scorching  his 
bare  temples,  a  crown  of  thorns  stabbing  him  at 
every  helpless  turn  of  his  restless  head;  when 
such  a  man,  under  such  circumstances,  can  rise 
above  the  wickedness,  cowardice  and  cheap  treason 
that  have  nailed  him  to  the  cross,  and  pray  (and 
pray  sincerely)  that  his  guilty  murderers,  villain- 


10       Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

ous  detractors  and  unscrupulous  slanderers  may 
be  forgiven,  that  man  bears  witness  that  he  has, 
at  least,  a  heart  of  good. 

And  it  was  just  such  a  prayer  which  came  from 
the  parched,  dry,  cracked  lips  of  this  man  of 
Nazareth  as  he  hung  upon  the  cross  and  cried  out, 

' '  Father,  forgive  them,  for  they  know  not  what 
they  do." 

Again  he  spoke  from  the  cross. 

There  was  standing  near,  a  woman  who  had  been 
chosen  of  God  to  give  him  birth.  She  was  sobbing 
convulsively.  She  was  realizing  what  had  been 
foretold  of  her  more  than  thirty  years  before — ' '  a 
sword  shall  pierce  through  thy  own  soul,  also." 
Mary,  the  mother  of  Jesus,  stood  there,  broken- 
hearted. Jesus  turned  his  head  and  looked  at 
John,  his  cousin,  bidding  him  take  that  weeping 
mother  to  his  home,  his  heart  and  care,  and  be 
unto  her  henceforth  a  loving  son. 

0  the  man  who,  in  the  hour  of  his  own  agony, 
shall  remember  his  mother,  and  crown  her,  make 
her  the  queen  of  his  life,  and  ordain  that  others 
shall  love  and  reverence  her,  proclaims  for  himself 
the  lustre  of  a  manhood  without  spot. 

Once  more  he  spoke  from  the  place  of  anguish — 
that  moment  on  the  edge  of  death.  There  his 
soul,  rising  from  the  depths  of  the  overwhelming 
waves  of  agony,  cries: 

1 '  Father,  into  thy  hands  I  commit  my  spirit. ' ' 

He  who  in  the  hour  and  article  of  death  can 
face  God  and  eternity,  and  commit  himself  to  the 


Christ  11 

hand  of  supreme  justice  as  a  confident  child  to 
the  arms  of  a  loving  father,  bears  witness  that 
in  his  soul  there  is  no  ghastly  memory  of  sin,  no 
sharp,  remembered  pang,  no  fear  of  offended  law. 
Such  a  confidence  and  such  a  committal  of  tri- 
umphant calm  bear  witness  that  the  heart  is  at 
rest  with  God,  and  is  conscious  of  its  own  good. 

For  two  thousand  years  the  world,  without  a 
dissenting  voice,  has  borne  witness  that  he  is  the 
one  man  who  came  into  the  earth  and  walked 
through  it  superlatively  good. 

Among  the  voices  in  the  common  consent  of  the 
world  that  Jesus  Christ  was  a  good  man,  there  are 
those  who  with  equal  insistence  deny  that  he  was 
Almighty  God. 

They  agree  that  he  had  the  spirit  of  God ;  that 
he  had  it  in  measure  such  as  no  other  man  before 
or  since.  They  announce  their  belief  that  he  is  the 
mightiest  advance  on  humanity  ever  known;  that 
all  other  religious  teachers  pale  before  him  as  the 
stars  before  the  sun.  They  speak  of  his  spotless 
life  with  fervent  admiration,  and  draw  special 
attention  to  his  discourses  as  models  of  exhorta- 
tion to  righteousness  and  truth.  To  them  the  ser- 
mon on  the  mount  is  a  chef  d'oeuvre.  Out  of  that 
sermon  they  take  the  maxim  about  doing  unto 
others  as  you  would  they  should  do  unto  you. 
They  take  that  maxim  and  frame  it  about  and 
make  it  the  "Golden  Rule"  of  human  life.  They 
exalt  Jesus  as  the  perfect  example,  telling  us  that 
if  we  shall  govern  our  life  by  him,  make  him  our 


12       Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

constant  copy,  imitate  him,  we  shall  fill  our  daily 
existence  with  righteousness  and  truth.  In  fact, 
if  we  seek  a  panegyric  on  the  humanity  of  Christ ; 
if  we  desire  to  see  his  goodness  exalted  to  the 
heavens,  and  his  humanity  put  beyond  compare 
with  the  sons  of  men — we  must  needs  go  to  the 
Socinian,  the  Arian  and  the  Unitarian — those  who 
deny  the  deity  of  Christ.  But  this  exaltation  of 
the  human  Christ  is  simply  setting  up  a  man  of 
straw  that  with  one  blow  of  deific  discount  he 
may  be  knocked  down  again.  He  is  set  up  as  man 
that  he  may  be  cast  down  as  God. 

They  will  not  accept  him  as  God. 

God  Almighty  (we  are  told)  cannot  be  confined 
or  shut  up  in  any  one  man.  Man  as  man  and, 
therefore,  every  individual  man  in  his  part,  is 
the  avatar  of  God.  Each  man  is  in  some  sense  the 
incarnation  of  God.  God  is  more  or  less  enthroned 
in  all  men.  God  is  to  be  found  in  all  men  as  he  is 
to  be  found  in  all  nature. 

A  good  man — call  Jesus  a  good  man — set  him 
up  as  high  as  you  please,  build  as  lofty  a  pedestal 
for  him  as  you  will,  but  Almighty  God — Never! 

Over  against  this  exaltation  of  Christ  as  a  merely 
good  man,  and  the  persistent  denial  that  he  was  God, 
stands  the  unmistakable  claim  which  Jesus  Christ 
himself  made — that  he  was  God. 

He  made  that  claim  in  many  ways. 

He  claimed  it  by  declaring  his  power  and  au- 
thority to  forgive  sin. 

That  was  a  striking  moment  when  he  proclaimed 


Christ  13 

it  for  the  first  time.  Four  men  had  brought  a 
paralytic  to  the  house  where  he  was  preaching. 
When  they  could  not  get  in  because  of  the  crowd, 
they  climbed  up  on  the  roof,  took  off  some  of  the 
tiling,  and  by  means  of  ropes  or  corners  of  the 
mattress  let  the  man  down  to  the  very  feet  of 
Jesus.  "When  he  saw  their  faith,  he  turned  to  the 
sick  man  and  said,  "Son  (son  of  Abraham),  thy 
sins  are  forgiven  thee." 

At  once  there  was  an  uproar.  The  leading  men, 
sitting  round  and  watching  him,  burst  out  with  a 
protest,  charging  him  with  blasphemy,  saying  that 
God  only  could  forgive  sin. 

And  they  were  right. 

No  mere  man  can  forgive  sin.  Again  and  again 
the  Scriptures  teach  us  that  forgiveness  is  with 
God  that  he  may  be  feared. 

In  announcing  the  man's  sins  forgiven,  Jesus 
clearly  claimed  the  prerogative,  power  and  au- 
thority, which  belong  to  God. 

He  claimed  this  equality  by  declaring  himself 
to  be  the  Son  of  God.  To  the  Jews,  «  <  Son  of  God ' ' 
was  equivalent  to  "God  the  Son."  It  meant  to 
them,  the  moment  he  styled  himself  by  that  name, 
an  unqualified  claim  to  essential  equality  with  the 
Father.  Because  of  this  they  raged  against  him 
and  would  have  killed  him,  crying  out  that  he  had 
made  himself  equal  with  God. 

He  made  this  claim  in  terms  which  admit  of  no 
misunderstanding.    He  said: 

"I  and  my  Father  are  one." 


14       Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

When  Philip  said,  "Shew  us  the  Father,  and  it 
snfficeth  lis, ' '  he  answered  and  said : 

1  *  Hast  thou  been  with  me  so  long  time  and  hast 
thou  not  known  me,  Philip  ?  From  henceforth  ye 
know  him  and  have  seen  him." 

To  Philip  he  had  also  said: 

"I  am  the  way  and  the  truth  and  the  life — no 
man  cometh  unto  the  Father  but  by  me." 

By  this  statement  he  deliberately  shut  out  all 
other  men  as  the  ground  and  means  of  approach 
to  God.  He  declares  that  God,  the  Father,  can 
be  found  in  and  through  him  alone ;  that  he  is  the 
supreme  way,  the  very  truth  and  the  very  life; 
not  that  he  knows  some  truth  and  has  a  measure 
of  life  in  common  with  men,  but  that  he  is  the 
truth — the  absolute  life.  Such  attitude,  such 
claimed  rights,  privileges  and  powers,  belong 
alone  to  God. 

But  he  goes  beyond  this. 

He  testifies  that  he  has  been  from  all  eternity 
the  manifestation  of  the  very  selfhood  of  the 
Father.    Hear  what  he  says : 

' '  And  now,  0  Father,  glorify  thou  me  with  thine 
own  self,  with  the  glory  which  I  had  with  thee 
before  the  world  was." 

He  traces  his  personality  backward  beyond  the 
hour  when  the  world  was  launched  into  space,  be- 
fore the  stellar  systems  were  created.  He  goes 
beyond  time,  he  takes  us  into  eternity,  and  in  that 
unbegun  and  measureless  distance  declares  with 
all  the  calm  assurance  of  accustomed  truthfulness 


Christ  15 

that  he  had  the  glory,  the  visibility,  the  outward 
manifestation  and  splendor  of  the  Father's  own 
essential  selfhood;  that  his  relation  to  him  was 
that  of  one  who  was  from  all  eternity  his  deter- 
mination, definition  and  utterance. 

Such  claims  as  these  are  the  claims  of  one  who 
declares  himself  to  be,  and  without  restraint, 
nothing  less  than  Almighty  God. 

On  one  occasion  when  talking  to  the  Jews  he 
said  that  Abraham  had  rejoiced  to  see  his  day, 
had  seen  it  and  was  glad.  They  turned  upon  him 
and  reminded  him  that  he  was  not  yet  fifty  years 
old,  how  then  could  he  have  seen  Abraham,  or 
Abraham  him — that  Abraham  who  had  been  dead 
nearly  two  thousand  years? 

He  faced  them  and  said: 

"Verily,  verily  I  say  unto  you,  before  Abraham 
was,  I  am." 

The  striking  thing  in  the  statement  is  not  the 
claim  of  pre-existence — great  as  that  is — not  that 
he  claimed  to  have  been  in  existence  already — not 
fifty  years  merely,  but  two  thousand — no !  all  these 
utterances  are  remarkable  enough,  but  these  are 
not  the  astounding  thing  he  said.  The  astounding, 
the  unspeakably  extraordinary  thing  he  said  is 
found  in  just  two  words: 

"I  am." 

There  is  one  place  in  Holy  Scripture  where  this 
phrase  is  supremely  used.  In  the  third  chapter 
of  the  book  of  Exodus  it  is  recorded  that  God 
manifested  himself  to  Moses  at  the  burning  bush, 


16       Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

and  there  declared  himself  to  be  the  God  of  Abra- 
ham, the  God  of  Isaac  and  the  God  of  Jacob.  He 
commanded  Moses  to  return  to  Egypt,  appear 
before  Pharaoh  and  demand  the  release  of  the 
Children  of  Israel  from  their  cruel  bondage ;  and 
when  Moses  inquired  by  what  name  he  should 
speak  to  the  people,  he  answered : 

1  i  Say  unto  them,  I  AM  hath  sent  me  unto  you.  ■ ' 

"I  AM." 

To  the  Jew  these  two  words  set  forth  the 
supreme  name  and  title  of  the  eternal  God. 

In  saying,  therefore,  "Before  Abraham  was — 
I  AM, ' '  Jesus  announced  himself  to  be  the  eternal, 
self-centred,  supreme  being,  Almighty  God.  When 
he  said  this,  and  because  they  understood 
him,  because  they  knew  exactly  what  he  meant 
by  these  words,  the  Jews  took  up  stones  to  stone 
him. 

If  I  were  seeking  to  demonstrate  by  object  les- 
son, and  in  a  fashion  that  would  admit  of  no  reply, 
that  Jesus  claimed  to  be  Almighty  God,  I  would 
summon  the  mightiest  and  most  masterful  artist 
the  world  knows  to  come  and  paint  for  me  the 
scene  which  takes  place  a  little  later  as  a  conse- 
quence of  that  moment  when  he  emphasizes  his 
claim  by  saying: 

"I  and  my  Father  are  ONE." 

The  picture  would  represent  a  great  crowd  of 
scowling,  fierce,  angry  Jews,  their  hands  filled  with 
stones — some  of  them  drawn  back,  the  whole  fig- 
ure intense  with  readiness  to  cast  the  fatal  stone — 


Christ  17 

and  Jesus,  standing  a  little  distance  apart,  looking 
calmly  on. 

Underneath  the  picture  I  would  have  written  in 
great  golden  letters  (letters  so  artistic,  so  start- 
ling, so  wonderful  in  form,  that  at  the  risk  of  art 
itself — almost  at  the  risk  of  minimizing  the 
picture  at  the  first  glance,  subordinating  it  to  in- 
terest in  the  letters  and  dividing  the  mind  of  the 
onlooker  between  the  actual  scene  and  the  letters 
themselves) — I  would  have  written  in  letters  that 
should  smite  the  eye  and  the  innermost  thinking 
of  the  beholder,  the  words  recorded  in  the  tenth 
chapter  of  John's  Gospel,  given  by  the  Jews  in 
reply  to  the  demand  of  Jesus  when,  speaking  with 
amazement,  he  asks,  "For  what  good  work  do  ye 
stone  me  f ' '  I  would  have  every  gazer  at  the  pic- 
ture read  these  words  till  they  rose  up  in  vastness 
against  him,  smiting  his  attention  as  the  very 
stones  in  the  hands  of  the  Jews — these  words : 

"For  a  good  work  we  stone  thee  not  but  for  blas- 
phemy; and  because  that  thou  BEING  A  MAN 
MAKEST  THYSELF  GOD." 

The  Jews  were  not  deceived. 

They  knew  what  he  had  done. 

They  knew  that  he  claimed  to  be  no  less  than 
very  God  himself. 

There  can  be  no  doubt  that  he  claimed  to  be  God. 

There  need  be,  really,  no  discussion  about  it. 

The  New  Testament  records  the  claim. 

I  am  not  making  any  issue  as  to  whether  the 
New  Testament  is  true,  or  reliable.    I  am  saying 


18       Chkist,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

thus  far,  only,  that  the  New  Testament  (the  Gos- 
pels of  the  New  Testament),  in  language  concern- 
ing which  there  can  be  no  possible  mistake  or  even 
ground  for  misinterpretation,  records  the  fact  that 
Jesus  Christ  did  claim  to  be  Almighty  God. 

If  Jesus  Christ  were  not  Almighty  God  (as  he 
claimed  to  be)  he  was  not  a  good  man  (as  it  is  said 
he  was). 

The  proposition  ought  to  be  self-evident. 

No  mere  man  can  claim  to  be  God  and  be  good. 

He  who,  as  mere  man,  claims  to  be  God,  robs 
God  of  the  glory  that  is  exclusively  his. 

He  who  thus  claims  to  be  God,  and  bids  men 
go  into  eternity  trusting  him  as  God,  is  a  deceiver. 

No  man  who  robs  God  of  equality,  and  who 
deceives  men  into  believing  that  he  is  God, 
can  be  good — he  is  a  wicked  and  blasphemous 
deceiver. 

There  is  only  one  way  in  which  the  character  of 
Jesus  Christ  can  be  saved  on  this  claim  of  his 
to  be  God — if  that  claim  were  not  true. 

It  can  be  saved  only  by  assuming  that  he  was 
self -deceived;  that  he  sincerely  believed  himself 
to  be  God,  but  was  blinded  and  held  fast  by  his 
own  mistaken  concept. 

But  the  man  who  claims  to  be  Almighty  God, 
and  claims  it  as  he  did,  can  be  self-deceived  only 
when  he  is  a  mental  weakling,  unbalanced  in  mind, 
or  absolutely  insane. 

None  of  these  things  can  be  predicated  of  Jesus 
Christ. 


Christ  19 

On  the  contrary,  he  was  the  most  intellectual 
man  the  world  has  ever  known. 

Mark  how  he  met  the  wisdom  and  the  genius 
of  the  men  who  surrounded  him.  Again  and  again 
they  came  to  him  with  crafty  and  perplexing  ques- 
tions. With  a  word  he  solved  their  problems, 
flashed  truth  into  their  shame-smitten  faces,  and 
silenced  them.  In  all  the  universe  there  is  no  soul 
meaner,  more  contemptible,  more  cowardly,  and 
utterly  lost  to  every  sense  of  decent  manhood  than 
the  man  who,  for  the  sake  of  entangling  a  good 
man  in  his  speech,  asks  him  questions  in  public, 
before  an  audience  ready  at  every  turn  to  mis- 
quote and  misinterpret  his  slightest  utterance ;  and 
that  is  what  they  did.  They  came  to  him,  not  with 
the  desire  to  know  the  truth,  but  to  confound  him, 
cast  him  down  and  destroy  his  prestige  with  the 
people.  To  every  question  he  gave  an  answer 
having  in  it  spiritual  truth,  but  bearing  the  un- 
mistakable stamp  of  rare  wisdom  and  intellectual 
superiority. 

His  words,  the  simple  speech  he  used  in  the 
midst  of  them,  or  alone  with  his  disciples,  have 
been  the  impulse  of  the  mightiest  intellectual 
activity  the  world  has  ever  known.  Out  of  his 
words  have  grown  systems  of  theology  that  may 
well  call  for  all  there  is  of  brain  power  and  capac- 
ity in  those  who  study  them.  Here  are  to  be  found 
the  keenest  speculations  and  the  farthest  outreach 
of  metaphysical  suggestion  and  the  most  detailed 
analysis  of  which  the  human  mind  is  capable. 


20       Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

Book  after  book,  treatise  after  treatise,  discourse 
after  discourse,  have  been  produced  out  of  the 
simplest  and  most  detached  things  he  said.  No 
man  can  read  his  speeches  and  not  find  the  mind 
stimulated,  shocked,  quickened  and  impelled  for- 
ward even  upon  the  most  daring  lines  of  thought. 

It  would  be  easy  to  call  the  roll  of  the  princes 
and  kings  in  the  realm  of  intellect,  men  whose 
thoughts  burn  and  flame  like  great  quenchless 
lights;  men  whose  minds  are  the  storehouses  of 
knowledge,  and  whose  utterances  by  word  and  j>en 
have  moved  the  quickest  and  most  forceful  lives 
in  the  world.  It  would  be  easy  to  call  the  long  roll 
of  these  names  shining  like  stars  and  constella- 
tions in  the  firmament  of  thought — princes  and 
kings  of  intellect  who  acknowledge  that  Jesus 
Christ  is  not  only  superior  to  them  morally  and 
spiritually,  but  intellectually. 

What  man  is  there  to-day  with  any  degree  of 
mental  self-respect  who  would  dare  to  stand  up 
and  assert  himself  the  equal  of  Jesus  Christ  in- 
tellectually? 

Without  necessity  of  demonstration,  it  ought  to 
be  a  truth  beyond  question  that  Jesus  Christ  was 
the  most  intellectual  man  the  world  has  ever 
known. 

Such  a  man  as  that  could  not  be  self-deceived. 

If  he  were  not  Almighty  God  he  knew  it. 

He  knew  it  as  well  as  these  good  Unitarians, 
and  these  wondrously  advanced  scholars  who  can- 
not get  beyond  the  glamour  of  his  humanity. 


Christ  21 

lie  knew  it  at  first  hands. 

If  he  were  not  Almighty  God — if  he  were  only 
a  man — he  knew  it,  knew  it  through  and  through, 
in  every  fibre  of  his  being. 

There  is  no  possibility  then  whatever  for  him 
to  have  been  deceived. 

If  he  were  not  deceived,  if  he  knew  he  was  not 
God,  then — 

HE  WAS  NOT  A  GOOD  MAN. 

This  is  his  own  argument: 

A  young  man  came  to  him  and  said,  "Good 
Master,  what  good  thing  shall  I  do,  that  I  may 
inherit  eternal  life?  and  he  said  unto  him,  "Why 
callest  thou  me  good?  there  is  none  good  but  one, 
that  is  God." 

The  argument  is  simple  enough. 

"You  call  me  good.  God  alone  is  good.  If  I  am  not 
God,  I  am  not  good." 

Not  good! 

Nay !  If  he  were  not  God,  he  was  the  most  wan- 
tonly wicked  man  of  whom  I  ever  heard. 

If  he  were  not  God,  not  only  does  disaster  fall 
upon  himself  in  the  total  destruction  of  his  char- 
acter, and  in  the  consequent  and  final  driving  of 
him  from  the  suffrage  and  consideration  of  men, 
but  the  disaster  falls  upon  all  who  have  put  their 
faith  in  him. 

If  Jesus  Christ  were  not  God,  then  he  never 
forgave  the  sins  of  a  single  soul,  and  all  those 
throughout  the  two  thousand  years  who  have  gone 
into  eternity  trusting  in  his  name  have  gone  into 


22       Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

that  eternity  unforgiven  and  unshrived  of 
God. 

If  Jesus  Christ  were  not  God,  then  he  has  not 
forgiven  the  sin  of  a  single  human  being  alive 
to-day. 

You  had  sinned!  There  were  memories  of  the 
sins  you  had  committed.  They  allowed  you  no 
rest.  They  gave  you  anguish  of  mind.  Others 
could  not  forgive  you.  You  could  not  forgive  your- 
self. The  consciousness  that  you  stood  naked  be- 
fore the  all-seeing  eye  of  a  holy  God ;  that  he  knew 
the  circumstances  and  every  detail  thereof,  down 
to  the  very  intents  and  purposes  lying  behind  your 
deeds,  and  even  your  thoughts;  that  he  looked 
into  and  saw  all  that  was  in  your  heart;  in  the 
consciousness  growing  clearer  and  stronger  and 
more  terrible  each  day  that  you  had  no  excuse, 
no  place  that  you  could  hold  for  a  moment;  that 
if  he  summoned  you  to  his  presence,  you  would 
stand  in  the  white  light  of  his  unmixed  holiness, 
and  the  inexorable  and  unrelenting  wrath  of  his 
essential  antagonism  and  just  hatred  against  sin; 
all  this  consciousness  taking  voice  in  you  and 
through  you,  cried  out  in  your  soul,  "I  am  guilty 
and  undone."  And  this  filled  you  with  a  horror 
of  great  darkness  and  the  utter  blackness  of  a 
hopeless  despair.  Then  you  heard  the  voice  of 
Jesus  Christ  saying,  "Come  unto  me."  "Him 
that  cometh  unto  me  I  will  in  no  wise  cast  out." 
You  came.  You  fell  at  his  feet.  You  owned 
his  death  as  your  atoning  sacrifice.    You  claimed 


Cheist  23 

him  as  your  substitute.  You  claimed  forgiveness 
through  his  blood.  He  said  to  you,  as  he  said  to 
the  paralytic, ' i  Thy  sins  are  forgiven  thee. ' '  You 
rose  and  went  away  as  when  one  is  released  from 
a  galling  chain ;  as  when  a  burden  that  was  crush- 
ing to  earth  has  been  lifted  from  the  sore,  bleed- 
ing shoulder;  as  when  one  who  has  been  tossed 
on  a  midnight  sea  enters  the  haven  while  the  dawn 
is  breaking,  casts  anchor  and  touches  shore.  For 
years  you  have  had  peace.  The  memory  of  your 
sins  are  there  (for  though  God  when  he  forgives 
forgets  them,  you  cannot).  Like  David,  perhaps, 
you  cry,  "My  sin  is  ever  before  me!"  The  sin 
marks  are  there  as  the  nail  holes  in  the  wall,  but 
you  have  been  able  to  look  at  them  and  have  peace 
because  you  have  said  to  yourself,  "I  am  not  an 
unwhipped  of  justice,  my  sins  have  been  pun- 
ished in  my  substitute;  they  have  been  fully  an- 
swered for  in  his  blood.  He  has  forgiven  me  and 
justified  me  and  made  me  clean.  In  him  I  stand 
clothed  in  the  very  '  righteousness  of  God. '  I  hate 
my  sin  and  despise  it  for  what  it  is  in  itself,  for 
what  it  made  him,  my  redeemer,  to  endure,  but  I 
have  peace  because  he  has  fully  satisfied  in  my 
behalf.  I  have  actually  satisfied  in  him  and  am 
delivered  before  God's  court  of  holiness  both  from 
the  guilt  and  the  demerit  of  sin.  I  have,  in  short, 
gone  through  the  judgment  with  Christ  on  the 
cross.  He  has  pronounced  forgiveness — absolu- 
tion— upon  me,  and  he  has  done  so  by  virtue  of  his 
power  and  authority  as  the  living  one  in  whom 


24       Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

dwelletli  all  the  fulness  of  the  godhead  bodily — 
as  my  saviour  and  my  God  he  has  forgiven  me 
and  I  am  at  peace.' ' 

All  this  you  have  said  within  yourself  and 
testified. 

But  I  ask  you  now  to  face  the  terrible  fact — if 
Jesus  Christ  were  not  God — this  terrible  fact — 
that  you  have  been  deceived. 

You  have  had  a  false  peace. 

You  have  been  living  in  a  fooPs  paradise. 

You  are  before  God  an  unpardoned  and  as  yet 
unpunished  criminal  awaiting  your  doom. 

All  this  is  absolutely  your  state — 

IF— 

If  Jesus  Christ  were  not  Almighty  God. 

If  Jesus  Christ  were  not  Almighty  God,  he  had 
no  authority  nor  power  to  forgive  your  sins.  NO ! 
And  if  Jesus  Christ  were  not  God  I  know  not 
where  to  bid  you  turn.  You  must  carry  the  load 
of  your  sins  all  your  days ;  and  when  you  die,  go 
into  eternity  and  face  a  holy  God  who  tells  you 
by  every  law  and  fact  of  nature  that  he  never  for- 
gives in  a  single  case  till  he  has  first  punished  the 
sin  and  with  it  the  sinner. 

If  Jesus  Christ  were  not  God,  his  death  was  not 
an  atonement. 

And  this  surely  should  be  plain  enough. 

Only  God  can  atone  to  God. 

Only  an  infinite  being  can  satisfy  an  infinite  being. 

If  Jesus  Christ  were  not  God  he  could  not  make 
an  atonement. 


Christ  25 

If  he  did  not  make  an  atonement,  then  the  world 
has  never  been  reconciled  to  God  nor  brought  up 
on  mercy  ground.  Instead  of  being  lifted  up  to 
the  plane  of  grace  and  mercy,  the  world  is  still 
under  the  condemnation  and  judgment  of  God,  no 
longer  under  a  suspended  sentence,  but  sheer  and 
defenceless,  with  nothing  to  hinder  the  crash  of 
doom  at  any  moment. 

There  is  no  hope.  There  is  no  daysman.  There 
is  no  one  to  offer  unto  God  what  he  demands,  and 
unto  man  what  he  needs.  There  is  no  mediator 
between  a  holy  God  and  a  sinful  man. 

If  Jesus  Christ  were  not  God,  then  he  did  not 
rise  from  the  dead.  He  did  not  bring  life  and 
immortality  to  light,  and,  as  for  me,  the  preacher, 
I  have  no  light  to  hold  out  to  you  in  the  all- 
embracing  gloom  and  night  of  death. 

There  is  no  hope. 

If  a  man  shall  tell  me  there  is  no  hereafter,  that 
death  ends  all,  I  shall  take  up  the  law  of  induction 
and  argue  him  to  a  standstill  along  the  line  of 
unfathomable  mysteries  and  inexplicable  psycho- 
logical phenomena  in  the  constitution  of  man,  and 
the  inexplicable  absence  of  the  phenomena  in  the 
state  of  death,  inexplicable  upon  any  known  ma- 
terialistic ground,  and  I  shall  laugh  at  his  inability 
to  maintain  his  thesis  beyond  the  poor  shred  of  a 
hypothesis.  If  a  man  shall  tell  me  as  the  result  of 
pure  reasoning  that  he  concludes  for  the  endless 
existence  of  the  soul  after  death,  and  shall  do  this 
even  upon  the  plane  of  induction,  I  shall  turn  and 


26       Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

tell  him  that  all  his  argument  is  based  upon  in- 
ference and  not  fact,  finding  its  largest  emphasis 
in  the  region  of  the  unknowable  and  guessable — in 
the  things  he  cannot  explain,  where  certain  con- 
clusions can  neither  be  successfully  affirmed,  nor 
successfully  denied,  and  where,  by  consequence,  he 
may  console  himself,  if  he  wish,  with  his  side  of 
the  guess ;  and  I  shall  feel  a  keen  sense  of  sorrow 
at  his  inability  to  hold  his  premise  in  the  final 
region  of  the  sure. 

And  what  does  all  this  mean? 

Is  it  playing  fast  and  loose  with  the  mind?  Am 
I  turning  in  upon  myself  and  playing  the  mere 
harlequin  in  the  arena  of  mental  gymnastics? 

No !  there  is  sane  meaning  to  this  double  method 
— it  is  this:  as  much  may  be  said  along  one  line 
of  reasoning  as  the  other.  Each  is  a  non-sequitur 
to  the  other.  Each  negatives  the  other  and  leaves 
us  with  reason's  torch  inverted — the  light  out,  the 
darkness  deeper  than  ever;  and  standing  on  the 
threshold  of  the  grave  we  are  forced  to  cry  out  in 
the  sharp  agony  of  a  continual  self- smiting  per- 
plexity : 

"To  be  or  not  to  be — that  is  the  question." 

Question  it  is — always  a  question — always  com- 
ing back  from  the  side  of  every  dead  body — 
always  coming  back  from  the  clod-filled  grave — 
coming  down  from  age  to  age,  coming  back  a  ques- 
tion no  man,  not  the  wisest  mere  man  who  ever 
lived,  could  answer,  or  any  living  wise  man  can 
answer  to-day. 


Cheist  27 

If  Jesus  Christ  were  not  God  it  cannot  be  an- 
swered; for  if  Jesns  Christ  were  not  God,  he  did 
not  rise  from  the  dead  and  by  divine  power  carry 
himself  out  of  the  region  of  death  forever. 

If  Jesus  Christ  were  not  God,  you  may  go  and 
sit  by  the  tomb  of  your  dead  and  weep  bitter  (be- 
cause hopeless)  tears. 

If  Jesus  Christ  were  not  God,  then  he  was  not  a 
redeemer  and  saviour.  All  the  beautiful  things 
that  have  been  taught  about  him  as  such  are 
false.  All  the  hopes  of  heaven,  the  beauty  of  the 
celestial  city,  the  tree  of  life,  the  river  of  crystal, 
the  company  of  the  saints,  the  arch-angelic  song, 
the  meeting  and  the  knowing  of  those  who  long 
ago  have  left  us — none  of  these  things  are  so. 

If  he  were  not  God,  then  it  is  not  true  that  he 
sits  upon  the  throne,  high  and  lifted  up,  listening 
to  the  plaints  of  the  weakest  heart  that  shall  trust 
him,  and  hearing  the  sound  of  every  falling  tear. 

If  Jesus  Christ  be  not  God,  then  the  whole  sys- 
tem of  Christianity  built  upon  his  person  and 
work  falls  to  the  ground,  is  broken  into  fragments, 
and  like  wind-swept  dust  can  never  be  gathered. 

If  Jesus  Christ  be  not  God,  the  New  Testament 
record  of  him  is  untrue.  The  New  Testament 
impeached  in  its  prime  particular  becomes  a 
worthless  book — a  book  full  of  exhortations  to 
holiness  and  truth,  in  the  name  of  him  who  is 
proven  to  be  (if  he  ever  lived  at  all)  a  blasphemer, 
a  deceiver  of  men  and  the  concrete  of  human 
wickedness.     If  the  New  Testament  is  not  true, 


28       Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

neither  is  the  Old ;  for  the  Old  Testament  finds  its 
meaning  and  value  only  in  the  Christ  of  the  New 
Testament,  Take  Jesus  Christ  out  of  the  Old 
Testament  (which  you  must  do  if  you  set  aside  the 
New;  for  he  alone  fulfils  the  types,  the  symbols 
and  the  prophecies  of  the  Old  Testament ;  he  alone 
makes  its  testimony  and  history  intelligible;  he 
alone  gives  unity,  harmony  and  authoritative 
meaning  to  its  exhortations) — take  Christ  out  of 
the  Old  Testament  and  you  take  away  its  one  and 
only  key. 

And  mark  you — ivhen  Christ  goes  out  of  the 
Bible  as  God — God  goes  out  of  the  Bible.  The 
deity  which  has  preserved  it,  the  power  which  has 
made  it  living  and  unchangeable  in  the  midst  of 
change  and  death,  will  have  been  dethroned. 

Without  Christ  as  God  you  are  without  any 
sane  and  satisfying  knowledge  of  God. 

Where  will  you  turn  to  find  God  and  know  him 
to  your  comfort?  You  might  as  well  look  into 
the  bottomless  pit  as  into  your  own  heart. 

No  more  satisfactory  will  it  be  to  look  into  the 
heart  of  others.  We  are  all  built  on  the  same 
plan. 

The  difference  is  only  in  degree  or  extension. 

The  basilar  fact  is,  God  cannot  be  found  in  any 
natural  man. 

You  cannot  find  or  know  him  to  your  heart's 
content  in  nature. 

What  kind  of  a  God  does  nature  reveal  to  you? 

I  will  answer  for  you — a  God  who  puts  you  in 


Cheist  29 

this  world  and  does  not  tell  you  whence  you  come, 
whether  from  the  all  mud  or  the  Almighty,  from 
an  angel  or  a  devil,  from  jelly  or  genius,  from  the 
heights  of  heaven  or  the  depths  of  hell.  A  God 
who  puts  you  here  and  fills  you  with  questions  he 
alone  can  answer  and — refuses  so  to  do.  A  God 
who  calls  you  into  the  world  and  gives  you  eyes 
to  see  everything  but  yourself.  A  God  who  hides 
you  from  yourself,  so  that  you  do  not  know 
whether  you  are  a  function  or  a  soul ;  whether  you 
are  matter  or  spirit;  whether  you  are  a  person- 
ality or  a  cellular  part  of  a  general  whole — called 
man.  A  God  who  gave  you  mind  with  seemingly 
infinite  possibilities  in  thought,  and  gave  you  a 
body  that  is  finite  and  temporary  in  construction. 
A  God  who  gives  you  an  intellect  which  grasps 
after  eternity,  and  is  always  saying  on  the  sum- 
mit of  any  endeavor  achieved,  "What  next?"  and 
yet  is  limited  to  a  few  inconsequent  years.  A  God 
who  sets  you  face  to  face  with  the  imminency  of 
death,  and  never  allows  you  to  know  at  what 
moment  you  must  go,  and  gives  you  no  hint  of  the 
beyond — or  whether  there  is  a  beyond. 

In  France  they  do  not  tell  the  man  who  is  to  be 
guillotined  till  a  few  moments  before  the  fatal 
hour.  He  is  sleeping  on  his  couch.  He  is  dream- 
ing of  pleasant  fields,  of  running  streams,  of  boy- 
hood's days,  of  to-morrows  that  shall  be  better — 
a  heavy  hand  is  laid  on  his  shoulder — he  starts 
up  in  bed — the  gray  light  of  early  morning  is 
filtering  in  through  the  barred  window  of  his  cell 


30       Christ,  Cheistianity  and  the  Bible 

— stern-faced  men  are  standing  before  him — they 
say,  "Your  hour  is  come;  follow  us." 

It  is  terrific. 

But  this  is  the  case  of  every  human  being. 

No  one  can  tell  when  the  summons  may  come — 
or  where. 

A  man  was  sitting  in  his  room  at  close  of  day. 
It  had  been  (so  he  said)  the  best  day  of  his  life. 
He  had  said  to  his  wife  that  he  never  loved  her 
more  than  he  did  then  (and  they  had  been  married 
many  years),  never  did  he  feel  more  content  that 
they  had  chosen  to  walk  together  through  life  than 
then.  He  was  full  of  plans  for  himself  and  for 
her  (saying  with  great  earnestness  that  their  last 
days  should  be  their  best  days).  She  answered 
back  that  she  was  glad  with  a  great  gladness  that 
it  was  so.  She  turned  away  for  a  moment  to 
glance  in  another  direction,  still  speaking  to  him. 
When  she  looked  back  he  was  gone — gone  while 
the  love  words  and  the  hope  words  were  still  on 
his  lips — the  finger  of  death  had  touched  his  heart 
— a  voice  had  whispered  in  his  ear,  "Come." 
There  was  only  a  lifeless  bit  of  clay  where  a  mo- 
ment before  had  been  a  body  pulsing  with  life, 
with  love,  with  hope. 

It  is  terrific — doomed — and  not  knowing  how 
soon  the  bolt  will  strike.  What  sort  of  a  God  is 
this  who  laces  your  body  with  a  network  of  laws, 
the  breaking  of  the  slightest  of  which — all  un- 
known to  you — may  send  you  forth  upon  a  path 
of  diseased  and  tortured  existence — in  which  the 


Christ  31 

body  from  whence  you  cannot  escape  shall  be  to 
you  as  a  chamber  of  horrors — a  place  of  the 
thumbscrew,  the  rack  and  the  fagot.  What  kind 
of  a  God  is  that  who  allows  the  aged  to  linger  out 
in  a  miserable  prolongation  of  wretched  days,  a 
burden  to  themselves,  a  burden  to  others,  and 
takes  away  the  widow's  only  son — her  only  sup- 
port! Who  is  the  God  who  creates  one  man  with 
all  the  equipment  for  life,  and  another  man  with 
all  the  lack  of  it  f  What  kind  of  a  God  is  this  who 
looks  down  out  of  the  heaven  of  day  and  the 
heavens  of  night,  and  sees  all  the  sorrow,  the  an- 
guish, the  pain,  the  unspeakable  tragedies,  and 
sends  no  wing  of  angel  to  cleave  the  pitiless  sky, 
no  voice  out  of  the  silence  to  console,  no  hand  to 
help? 

What  man  is  there  of  you,  if  he  had  the  power, 
would  not  banish  sickness,  sorrow,pain  and  death? 

What  man  is  there  of  you  who,  if  he  could, 
would  not  make  every  human  being  well  and 
happy? 

What  then  ?  What  is  the  conclusion  of  the  mat- 
ter concerning  you?  Simple  enough — you  have 
the  heart  to  do  it,  but  not  the  power. 

What  is  the  conclusion  concerning  this  God  of 
nature?  He  has  the  power — but  does  not  manifest 
the  heart. 

What  will  you  say  of  this  God  of  nature  in  such 
a  scheme? 

What  can  you  say  but  that  your  heart  is  better 
than  the  heart  of  the  God  which  nature  reveals? 


32       Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

Can  you  hear,  understand  and  love  a  God  like 
that? 

Can  you  climb  through  nature  up  to  nature's 
God  and  say,  "I  have  found  him,  I  know  him"? 

You  can  climb  up,  but  where  will  you  find  him? 

You  will  find  him  wrapped  in  the  black  thunder- 
cloud or  girded  with  the  robe  of  the  lightnings. 
You  will  find  him  the  God  who  splits  the  earth  in 
twain  with  the  earthquake's  riving  blow,  loosens 
the  bands  of  the  sea,  sends  tidal  waves  in  surges 
of  destruction,  pours  out  the  lava  streams  from 
the  volcano's  cone,  as  kings  pour  wine  from  an 
earthen  cup,  spilling  the  wine  and  breaking  the 
cup;  the  God  who  turns  an  earthly  paradise  (like 
Messina)  into  a  fire-smitten  desert,  and  a  city  of 
the  living  into  a  cemetery  of  the  unburied  dead. 

When  your  heart  aches,  will  such  a  God  care 
for  you?  Will  his  thunders  console  you?  When 
your  soul  is  dark,  will  his  lightnings  illumine  it? 
When  you  yearn  for  love,  will  his  inexorable  law 
supply  it? 

Ah,  sirs,  without  Christ  you  are  without  a  God 
whom  you  can  love,  whom  you  can  trust,  to  whom 
you  can  go,  and  in  whose  strength  you  can  lie 
down  and — at  last — be  folded  in  peace. 

If  Jesus  Christ  is  not  God,  if  the  only  God  to 
whom  you  can  go  is  the  God  of  nature,  then  you 
might  as  well  fall  down  in  the  sand  at  the  base 
of  the  far  Egyptian  sphynx,  open  your  eyes  for 
a  moment  to  the  blue  sky  that  spreads  away  to 
the  horizon  before  its  staring  face,  its  cold,  chis- 


Cheist  33 

elled,  inscrutable  smile,  and  the  next  moment  shut 
your  eyes  against  the  pelting  dust  the  idle  winds 
blow  thither. 

Ah!  Nature  is  a  sand-dune — and  the  God  of 
nature  is  a  Sphynx. 

Do  you  care  to  kneel  and  worship  there? 

If  Jesus  Christ  be  not  God  the  disaster  is  not 
alone  to  him,  but  to  you — to  me. 

If  he  were  not  God,  then  we  are  in  a  world 
where  the  very  day  is  no  better  or  brighter  than 
a  starless  midnight. 

If  Jesus  Christ  were  a  good  man,  a  supremely  good 
man  and  a  supremely  intellectual  man,  then  he  was 
and  is  (as  he  claimed)  Almighty  God. 

The  New  Testament  says  he  was  a  supremely 
good,  and  a  supremely  intellectual  man. 

For  two  thousand  years  the  most  brilliant  men 
in  the  world  have  corroborated  this  record  by 
freely  testifying  that  Jesus  Christ  was  a  su- 
premely good  and  a  supremely  intellectual  man; 
all  this  being  so,  I  change  the  conditional  form  of 
the  proposition  to  the  indicative  and  declarative 
and  now  say: 

Since  Jesus  Christ  was  a  supremely  good  and  a 
supremely  intellectual  man,  he  was,  therefore  (as  he 
claimed),  Almighty  God. 

He  could  not  be  a  supremely  good  and  a  su- 
premely intellectual  man  and  claim  to  be  God 
unless  he  were  God. 

Since  he  claimed  to  be  God,  therefore,  he  was 
God. 


34       Chkist,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

Yes ;  lie  was  God. 

The  evidences  are  manifold. 

He  was  sinless. 

He  said: 

" Which  of  yon  convinceth  me  of  sin?" 

For  two  thousand  years  he  has  been  in  the  con- 
centrated light  of  a  hostile  world's  merciless  in- 
vestigation. The  light  has  been  turned  on  the 
land  in  which  he  lived.  Every  rod  of  ground  over 
which  he  travelled  has  been  dug  up,  or  surveyed, 
or  trodden.  His  words  have  been  weighed,  bal- 
anced to  a  nicety  against  any  probability  of  error, 
mistake,  imagination,  fancy  or  misquotation.  His 
words  have  been  split  open  as  men  break  open 
rocks.  All  the  contents  of  his  words  have  been 
put  in  the  crucible  of  criticism.  Every  thought 
has  been  insistently  and  unsentimentally  assayed 
for,  even,  the  suspicion  or  the  slightest  hint  of  an 
alloy.  His  teachings  have  been  chemically  dis- 
solved and  turned  into  their  component  parts. 
The  saline  base  of  truth  has  been  sought  for  at 
any  risk  to  the  compounded  speech  he  made. 

And  after  all!  not  one  self-respecting,  authori- 
tative lip  has  uttered  a  charge  against  him. 

In  the  hush  of  a  world  that  cannot  even  mur- 
mur, he  steps  forward  and  once  more  rings  down 
his  challenge: 

"Which  of  you  convinceth  me  of  sin?" 

He  stands  out  among  his  fellows  as  a  white 
shaft  under  a  starless  midnight.  He  rises  above 
the  passions  of  men  as  an  unshaken  rock  in  the 


Cheist  35 

midst  of  a  wild,  lashed  sea.  He  is  to  man's  best 
character  as  harmony  is  to  discord,  as  a  smile  is 
to  a  frown,  as  love  is  to  hate,  as  blessing  is  to 
cursing,  as  a  garden  of  lilies  to  a  desert  of  sand, 
as  heaven  is  to  earth,  as  holiness  is  to  sin  and  as 
life  to  death. 

If  he  were  sinless,  he  was  absolutely  holy;  he 
was  so  holy  that  his  very  presence  brought  out  the 
sin  in  others.  Sinful  men  and  women  fell  at  his 
feet  and  confessed  their  sins.  At  sight  of  him 
demons  tore  their  way  out  of  the  bodies  they  pos- 
sessed and  fled  as  clouds  of  darkness  before  the 
sun,  crying  as  they  fled,  "Thou  art  the  holy  one 
of  God — hast  thou  come  to  torment  us  before  the 
time  1 ' '  Tormented  as  they  were  even  then,  as  sin 
always  is  when  confronted  by  holiness ;  as  vice  is 
before  virtue ;  as  a  lie  is  before  the  truth. 

He  was  sinless. 

He  was  holy. 

His  sinlessness  and  holiness  cannot  be  ac- 
counted for  on  natural  grounds. 

All  his  natural  ancestry  were  sinful. 

His  sinlessness  cannot  be  accounted  for  unless 
he  were  God;  for,  sinlessness  and  holiness  come 
alone  from  God  and,  as  essential  qualities,  take 
their  rise  alone  in  God. 

His  power  over  nature  proved  him  God. 

His  look  changed  water  into  wine,  his  word  gave 
sight  to  the  blind,  healing  to  the  deaf,  speech  to 
the  dumb.  At  his  word  the  lame  man  leaped  as  a 
hart,  the  leper  was  cleansed.    He  said,  "Peace, 


36       Chkist,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

be  still,"  and  the  wild  tempest  of  the  sea  was 
hushed,  and  there  was  a  great  calm,  a  calm  like 
nnto  the  stillness  of  the  unruffled  rest  of  God. 

For  two  thousand  years  his  regenerative  power  in  a 
world  of  sin  has  been  the  proof  that  he  was  God. 

For  two  thousand  years,  in  every  age,  in  every 
clime,  among  all  classes  of  men,  from  the  refined 
infidel  to  the  vilest  sinner,  from  the  cold  atheist 
to  the  brutal  idolater,  men  have  been  changed — 
transformed.  Men  who  have  been  the  bond  slaves 
of  passion,  whose  daily  lives  have  been  the  output 
of  iniquity,  whose  deeds  have  been  for  destruc- 
tion, whose  words  have  been  poison,  and  whose 
inmost  thoughts  have  been  as  the  vapors  of 
miasma — these  all — have  been  transformed  into 
fountains  of  purity,  into  angels  of  mercy,  or  as 
illuminated  missals  have  been  written  full  of  the 
name  and  the  glory  of  God ;  men  whose  every  fibre 
was  as  the  coarse  and  tangled  threads  of  a  brutal 
unrefinement  have  become  men  whose  every  line 
of  character  was  as  the  woven  gold  of  Ophir — 
and  the  speech  that  once  smote  with  discord  the 
ears  that  heard  it  has  become  as  the  sound  of 
singing  across  silent  waters  and  under  listening 
stars.  And  you  ask  these  transfigured  human 
beings,  as  you  find  them  travelling  along  the  high- 
way of  twenty  noteful  centuries,  what  it  was  that 
so  changed  them,  put  such  new  force  and  impetus 
in  them,  making  them  to  be  as  men  new  created, 
and  they  will  tell  you  that  Jesus  Christ  came  along 
that  way,  they  saw  in  his  face  the  stain  of  blood, 


Christ  37 

the  marks  of  nails  were  in  his  hands  and  feet,  he 
had  the  appearance  of  one  who  had  been  cruelly 
slain.  He  stopped,  looked  at  them  and  said: 
"Come  unto  me."  They  obeyed,  they  fell  at  his 
feet.  He  touched  them,  a  strange,  keen  sense 
thrilled  through  them.  He  said  to  them,  "Arise." 
They  arose  and  found  themselves  new  men — men 
twice  begotten. 

Ask  the  drunkard  who  tried  to  be  sober,  broke 
every  pledge  and  drank  in  his  cup  the  very  life 
blood  of  those  he  loved  and  who  loved  him — how 
at  last  he  found  strength  to  say  a  final  "no,"  turn 
from  the  accursed  thing,  and  enter  a  world  all  new 
in  which  to  live,  a  freeman  and  no  more  a  slave — 
he  will  tell  you,  "Jesus  Christ  did  it  all." 

Ask  any  of  the  bond  slaves  of  passion,  men 
who  have  been  gripped  by  every  form  of  human 
desire,  and  whiplashed,  and  stung,  and  tortured 
by  their  gratification,  and  driven  to  fresh  and 
maddening  excess  by  the  never  satisfied  and 
always  burning  lust  within  (ever  crying  like  the 
horseleach's  daughter,  "Give,  give");  ask  them 
how  it  is  that  to-day  they  are  freemen  and  walk 
as  kings,  and  they  will  tell  you  that  Jesus  Christ 
laid  hold  of  them,  and  by  the  might  of  his  power, 
the  tenderness  of  his  love,  and  the  wealth  of  his 
grace,  made  them  free. 

And  this  has  been  going  on  for  two  thousand 
years. 

The  story  has  recently  been  told  of  a  great 
thinker  lecturing  one  day  before  a  large  audience 


38       Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

of  medical  students — some  eighteen  hundred  men 
who  pressed  in  to  hear  him.  He  took  from  his 
desk  a  letter,  and  holding  it  up  before  him,  said 
something  to  this  effect: 

"Gentlemen!  I  have  here  a  letter  from  one  of 
your  number,  in  which  he  tells  the  story  of  his  life 
— a  record  of  shame,  of  sinful  indulgence,  that 
makes  me  shudder  even  to  look  at  the  letter.  At 
the  close  of  this  fearful  confession  he  asks,  'Can 
your  God  save  such  an  one  as  I  am?'  " 

Stopping  for  a  moment  and  surveying  his  audi- 
ence, the  speaker  said:  "When  I  came  to  the  city 
this  afternoon  (it  was  the  city  of  Edinburgh) 
there  was  a  beautiful,  fleecy  cloud  spreading  itself 
like  a  thing  of  glory  in  the  upper  sky,  and  I  said, 
'  0  cloud,  where  do  you  come  from  1 9  and  the  cloud 
answered  me  and  said,  'I  come  from  the  slums 
and  the  low,  vile  places  of  the  city.  The  sun  of 
heaven  reached  down  and  lifted  me  up  and  trans- 
figured me  with  his  shining. '  ' ' 

Looking  about  upon  the  now  deeply  impressed 
throng,  the  speaker,  after  a  solemn  pause,  said : 

"I  do  not  know  whether  this  young  man  is  here 
or  not,  but  if  he  is,  I  can  say  to  him  that  my 
Saviour  and  my  Master,  Jesus  Christ,  he  who  is 
our  great  God  and  Saviour,  he  can  reach  down 
from  the  highest  heaven  to  the  lowest  depths  into 
which  a  human  soul  can  sink,  and  can  lift  you, 
and  lift  you  up  and  up,  till  he  shines  in  you  and 
through  you,  and  transfigures  you  with  the  light 
of  his  love  and  glory." 


Christ  39 

He  can. 

He  does. 

He  is  doing  it  now. 

And  who  is  he  who  can  do  this  but  the  living 
God  alone? 

That  Jesus  Christ  was  God  is  the  testimony  of  the 
men  who  lived  in  intimate  communion  with  him  and 
knew  him  best. 

John  leaned  on  his  breast  at  supper.  John 
heard  and  knew  the  beating  of  the  Master's  heart, 
and  John  says : 

' '  In  the  beginning  was  the  Word,  and  the  Word 
was  with  God,  and  the  Word  was  God  (God  was 
the  Word).  The  same  was  in  the  beginning  with 
God.  All  things  were  made  by  him;  and  without 
him  was  not  anything  made  that  was  made.  .  .  . 
And  the  Word  was  made  flesh,  and  dwelt  among 
us  (and  we  beheld  his  glory,  the  glory  as  of  the 
only  begotten  of  the  Father)  full  of  grace  and 
truth.' ' 

Again  this  same  John  writes : 

"  Jesus  Christ  .  .  .  THIS  IS  THE  TEUE 
GOD." 

Writing  to  the  Philippians,  Paul  declares,  that 
Jesus  Christ  was  in  the  "form  of  God,"  laid  aside 
his  glory  as  such,  took  upon  him  the  "form"  of 
sinful  man,  became  obedient  unto  death,  even  the 
death  of  the  cross,  carried  his  humanity  through 
hades  and  the  grave,  rose  out  from  among  the  dead, 
and  took  that  humanity  to  the  throne  of  the  high- 
est.    There  God  the  Father  reclothed  him  with 


40       Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

the  unbegun  and  uncreated  glory  which  he  had 
laid  aside,  gave  him  a  name  which  is  above  every 
name,  even  the  name  of  Jesus,  and  has  highly  and 
eternally  ordained  that  every  knee  in  the  wide 
extended  universe  shall  bow,  and  every  tongue 
confess,  that  he  is  Lord  to  the  glory  of  God  the 
Father. 

In  his  epistle  to  the  Colossians,  the  Apostle 
Paul  announces  that  this  "same  Jesus"  is  the 
"image  of  the  invisible  God;  by  him  were  all 
things  created  that  are  in  heaven,  and  that  are  in 
earth,  visible  and  invisible,  whether  they  be 
thrones  or  dominions,  or  principalities  or  powers ; 
all  things  were  created  by  him,  and  for  him." 

To  the  same  Colossians  he  further  writes : 

"In  him  dwelleth  all  the  fulness  of  the  Godhead 
bodily." 

To  the  Hebrews  he  says :  ' '  He  is  the  brightness 
of  the  Father's  glory,  and  the  express  image  of 
his  person"  (the  word  "image"  is  xaPafCT*?P  and 
signifies  an  "engraving,"  the  very  engraving  of 
God  in  the  flesh,  the  engraving  of  God  in  human- 
ity) and  upholding  all  things  by  the  word  of  his 
power.  "Upholding  all  things!"  this  earth  in  its 
orbit  about  the  sun ;  the  sun  in  its  orbit  about  some 
other  sun ;  all  suns  and  systems  in  their  orbits  of 
splendor,  whirling  onward  in  ever-widening  dis- 
tances over  highways  of  infinite  spaces,  through 
extensions  that  are  measureless,  and  where  time 
does  not  count.  In  that  unmeasured  expansion 
where  the  points  of  the  compass  are  lost  and  "di- 


Christ  41 

mension"  is  a  meaningless  term;  in  that  incom- 
prehensible and  indefinable  vastness,  filled  with 
the  might  and  the  majesty  of  form,  of  weight,  of 
motion  and  limitless  power — all  things — are  hang- 
ing on  his  word  and  obeying  his  will. 

Not  only  does  the  New  Testament  proclaim  him 
God — the  Old  Testament  does  likewise,  and  with 
unmistakable  speech. 

The  prophet  Isaiah  says: 

"Unto  us  a  child  is  born,  unto  us  a  son  is 
given,  and  the  government  shall  be  upon  his 
shoulder ;  and  his  name  shall  be  called  Wonderful, 
Counsellor,  the  mighty  God,  the  everlasting 
Father." 

Micah,  the  prophet,  glorifies  the  little  town  of 
Bethlehem,  least  as  it  is  among  the  thousands  of 
Judah,  and  foretells  that  he  who  shall  be  born 
there,  and  is  to  be  ruler  in  Israel,  is  he  "whose 
goings  forth  have  been  from  old,  from  everlast- 
ing." He  who  has  been  the  outgoing  and  the 
forth-putting  of  the  invisible  God;  and  who 
is,  and  who  alone  can  be,  the  visibility  of 
God. 

When  we  turn  to  the  New  Testament  once  more, 
we  are  given  a  vision  of  him,  in  Patmos,  where  he 
appears  to  that  beloved  John  who  had  leaned  so 
heavily  on  his  heart  in  the  days  of  the  earthly 
pilgrimage.  It  is  a  vision  of  wonder,  of  glory, 
and  divine  splendor.  He  is  seen  as  a  man — as 
one  who  had  become  dead,  who  was  now  alive,  who 
had  conquered  both  death  and  the  grave.    His  face 


42       Cheist,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

shone  with  the  light  of  the  noonday  sun,  his  eye 
glances  were  as  a  flame  of  fire,  and  when  he  spoke, 
his  voice  was  as  the  sound  of  many  waters;  and 
this  is  what  he  said  for  himself : 

"I  am  Alpha  and  Omega,  the  beginning  and 
the  ending,  saith  the  Lord,  which  is,  and  which 
was,  and  which  is  to  come,  the  Almighty." 

This  is  the  climax. 

He  claimed  to  be  Almighty  God  while  on  earth. 

He  claims  it  from  heaven. 

He  says  I  am  God — he  says  that  because  he  de- 
clares himself  as  embracing  the  whole  extent  of 
being. 

Listen : 

"I  am  he  that  is" — that  is  to  say,  the  self -exist- 
ing one ;  for  the  statement  is  the  cognate  of  that, 
"I  am  that  I  am,"  which  is  the  pre-eminent  ap- 
pelative  of  deity. 

"I  am  he  which  was" — and  this  extends  being 
into  the  past;  that  past  he  himself  defines.  He 
does  not  say  I  am  in  the  beginning,  but  I  am  the 
beginning — beginning  itself — the  origin  of  things 
and,  therefore,  himself  unbegun,  eternal,  from 
everlasting.  It  is  the  echo  of  that  far-flung  phrase 
of  old :  Even  from  everlasting  to  everlasting  thou 
art  God." 

"I  am  he  which  is  to  come" — this  includes  eter- 
nity future — the  unendingness  which  stretches 
without  a  horizon  beyond  the  present. 

Here  is  fulness — and  the  fulness  of  the  Godhead 
bodily. 


Cheist  43 

In  saying  these  words  upon  Patmos,  then,  our 
Lord  Jesus  Christ  says: 

"I  am  God — I  am  Almighty  God." 

Nor  is  this  a  mere  conclusion  from  the  premise 
here! 

He  says  it  directly,  plainly  and  squarely  him- 
self. 

He  says  not  only  that  he  is,  and  was,  and  is  to 
come — but  he  says — 

"I  AM  THE  ALMIGHTY." 

And  Paul,  the  special  apostle  of  the  Church, 
unites  with  Thomas  (the  believing,  but  material 
evidence  demanding  representative  of  the  elect 
remnant  in  Israel)  in  proclaiming  the  deity  of 
God's  Christ. 

Thomas  falls  at  his  feet  and  cries : 

"My  Lord  and  My  God." 

Paul  bows  his  head  in  adoration  before  him  and 
writes : 

ilOur  great  God  and  Saviour — Jesus  Christ." 

Upon  the  august  throne  of  the  universe  he  is 
seated. 

He  who  lay  a  babe  upon  a  woman's  breast;  who, 
although  he  was  infinite,  became  an  infant;  who 
being  in  the  form  of  God,  did  not  hesitate  to  put 
off  the  divine  glory  and  put  on  mortal  humanity 
that  (as  an  infinite  person)  he  might,  through  the 
"prepared"  body  of  his  mortality,  offer  an  in- 
finite sacrifice  for  men;  who  died  under  a  male- 
factor's doom,  but  with  his  nailed  hands,  in  the 
hour  of  his  agony,  saved  a  thief  from  hell — opening 


44       Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

to  him  the  gates  of  Paradise ;  he  who  refused  the 
deliverance  of  angels  when  they  bent  above  his 
cross,  that  by  his  cross  he  might  give  to  men  the 
deliverance  angels  could  not  give;  he  who  was 
buried  in  a  borrowed  grave;  who  rose  as  an  im- 
mortal man,  ascended  as  the  Second  Adam — the 
New  Head  of  Humanity — the  Life  Giver  to  a 
world,  and  took  his  seat  on  the  Father' 's  throne, 
as  witness  of  redemption  achieved  and  salvation 
secured — he  sits  there  now,  and  having  taken  to 
himself  the  glory  which  he  had  with  the  Father 
before  all  worlds  were,  having  clothed  his  im- 
mortal humanity  with  that  "form  of  God"  which 
ever  was  his,  now  sits  the  centre  of  a  world's 
adoration  and  heaven's  amaze,  as  the  GOD  MAN 
— the  highest  form  of  God  and  the  ultimate  form 
of  man ;  the  proclamation  that  man  in  Christ  is  the 
archetype  of  God  and  God  in  Christ  the  archetype 
of  man. 

As  we  thus  gaze  upon  him  in  whom  dwelleth 
all  the  fulness  of  the  Godhead  bodily ;  as  we  medi- 
tate upon  him,  seek  to  reason  about  him,  are 
touched  by  his  love,  held  by  his  power,  and  filled 
with  his  life,  we  say  with  the  inspired  apostle: 
"Without  controversy,  great  is  the  mystery  of 
godliness:  God  ivas  manifest  in  the  flesh.7' 

"Our  great  God"  repeats  Paul,  and  he  adds, 
to  balance  the  wonder  of  it,  "and  our  Saviour 
Jesus  Christ;"  he  who,  in  some  glad  day  nearer 
than  we  think,  is  coming  back  to  this  old,  sin- 
stained,   grave-digged  world — to   be   owned   and 


Chkist  45 

saluted    by    all    nations,    peoples,    kindred    and 
tongues  as — 

"THE  GOD  OF  THE  WHOLE  EARTH." 

With  all  this  glory  and  this  wonder  he  is,  as  the 
angels  said  (who  spoke  of  his  ascension,  session 
and  Second  Coming),  "THIS  SAME  JESUS," 
full  of  tender  mercy,  and  loving  compassion; 
by  virtue  of  his  perfect  sacrifice  able  to 
save  unto  the  uttermost  all  who  come  unto  God 
the  Father  by  him ;  saying  from  heaven  as  he  once 
said  on  earth :  ' '  Him  that  cometh  unto  me,  I  will 
in  no  wise  cast  out";  but  saying  at  the  same  time, 
and  with  unfailing  faithfulness:  "No  man  cometh 
unto  the  Father  but  by  me" ;  saying  it  faithfully 
because,  of  a  truth,  only  in  the  Son  can  the  Father 
be  found. 

Let  me  exhort  all  who  may  read  these  lines,  if 
you  have  not  already  done  so,  to  fall  down  at  his 
pierced  feet,  and  with  deep  contrition  for  all  your 
transgressions  and  for  your  very  nature  of  sin 
which  helped  to  nail  him  to  the  accursed  tree,  say 
with  voice  of  unfailing  love  and  unfaltering  faith : 

"My  Saviour  and  my  God." 

If  you  have  already  owned  him  as  your  Saviour, 
then,  as  Thomas  of  old,  with  the  voice  of  deep 
devotion  say: 

"My  Lord  and  my  God." 

To  those  of  you  (if  there  be  such)  who  still  deny 
his  deity  and  persist  in  calling  him  good,  he,  him- 
self, is  asking  you  from  heaven  as  he  asked  it 
aforetime  upon  earth : 


46       Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

"Why  callest  thou  me  good?" 

In  asking  you  that  he  is  putting  upon  you  the 
responsibility  of  the  terrible  conclusion  of  your 
own  premise: 

IF  NOT  GOD— NOT  GOOD! 

Are  you  willing  to  face  him  in  eternity  with 
that  inexorable  alternative : 

"IF  NOT  GOD— NOT  GOOD?" 


Christianity 

WHAT  IS  CHRISTIANITY? 

^-— ^HAT  is  Christianity? 
m      I    w  ^^e  (lues^on  seems  a  belated  one. 
I    I    lit  never  was  more  pertinent  than  now. 
\Bx     Its  pertinency  rests  upon  two  facts. 

First :  the  modern  drift  in  Christianity  and  its 
absolute  failure. 

Second:  the  phenomenal  triumph  of  primitive 
Christianity. 

The  modern  drift  is  antagonistic  to  doctrine 
and  repudiates  the  miraculous. 

It  sets  aside  the  virgin  birth,  has  no  toleration 
for  atonement  by  sacrificial  death,  and  positively 
refuses  to  accept  the  bodily  resurrection  of  our 
Lord  Jesus  Christ. 

It  holds  that  God  is  the  Father  of  all  men.  Each 
man  is  inheringly  a  son  of  God.  He  has  in  him 
all  the  elements  of  the  divine  lineage.  Exercise 
and  culture  are  alone  needed  to  reveal  these  ele- 
ments and  demonstrate  this  lineage.  Salvation  is 
not  the  redemption  of  a  child  of  the  Devil,  but 
recovery  of  a  child  of  God  from  the  hands  of  the 
Devil.  Salvation  is  the  restoration  of  the  indi- 
vidual to  the  consciousness  of  this  relationship; 
but  salvation  is  effectively  individual  only  as  it  is 

47 


48       Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

primarily  social.  The  time  has  passed  (so  we  are 
told)  when  the  individual  may  be  discussed  and 
his  social  condition  ignored.  To  seek  out  an  indi- 
vidual here  and  there  and  endeavor  to  redeem  or 
recover  him  while  the  environment  remains  un- 
changed, is  a  waste  of  force :  as  foolish  as  it  would 
be  to  spend  millions  on  remedies  for  people  sick 
with  malaria  in  a  pestilential  and  malarial  dis- 
trict, and  ignore  the  condition  of  the  district. 
True  wisdom  would  demand  first  of  all  that  the 
district  be  purged,  the  environment  made  healthy, 
the  cause  of  malaria  destroyed. 

Human  beings  are  neither  sinning  nor  suffering 
because  a  possible  first  man  away  back  some- 
where ate  forbidden  fruit  at  the  insistent  appeal 
of  his  too  persistent  wife.  Men  are  sinning  and 
suffering  because  social  conditions  are  all  wrong. 
These  wrong  conditions  fill  the  multitude  with  dis- 
couragement and  depression.  They  are  unable  to 
breathe  an  inspiring  life  force.  They  cannot 
obtain  sufficient  impulse  to  live  above  low  levels. 
The  laws,  the  customs,  the  inequalities  of  life, 
hedge  them  like  brutes  in  a  corral.  This  corralling 
and  hedging  of  humanity  en  masse,  while  the  few 
pull  away  from  the  crowd  and  create  an  environ- 
ment satisfactory  to  themselves  at  the  expense  of 
the  crowd,  is  the  r  arson  d'etre  for  all  evil  con- 
ditions. Let  us  have  right  legislation.  Let  us 
make  right  laws.  The  moment  the  social  condition 
enables  a  man  to  discover  the  divine  things  in 
him,  he  will  live  right  by  preference.    We  are  no 


Christianity  49 

longer  to  spend  eloquence,  prayer  and  time  on 
revivals,  and  now  and  then,  here  and  there, 
get  an  individual  to  live  fairly  right  in  spite  of 
hindering  conditions.  The  sermon  of  the  preacher 
should  appeal  to  the  law-maker  rather  than  to  the 
law-breaker;  it  should  arouse  men,  not  to  the 
danger  of  a  hell  far  off,  but  to  a  hell  near  at  hand, 
the  hell  of  unjust  laws,  of  sanitary  neglect,  of 
oppression  of  man  by  man. 

Social  redemption !  that  is  the  watchword. 

Social  salvation!  that  is  the  crying  need. 

All  this  (we  are  told)  is  to  be  accomplished  by 
appealing  to  the  divine  in  man,  to  his  hitherto 
ignored  resources.  This  appeal  can  be  made  of 
avail  only  by  setting  up  some  human  figure  in 
which  this  divine  life  has  been  fully  proved  and 
clearly  portrayed.  In  the  nature  of  the  case,  for 
a  modernist  Christian,  such  a  person  is  to  be 
found  alone  in  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ.  By  such 
he  is  now  hailed,  and  continually  announced,  as 
the  advanced  man,  the  quintessent  demonstration 
of  evolution  as  applied  to  humanity,  the  way- 
shower,  the  exemplar  and  true  copy.  He  is  in- 
carnate altruism.  His  whole  life  was  self-denial. 
His  daily  interest  was  in  social  conditions.  To 
him  society  was  the  objective,  the  individual  an 
incident.  His  teachings,  when  fairly  construed, 
involve  the  overthrow  of  the  old,  and  the  bringing 
in  of  a  radically  new  society,  in  which  the  divine 
life  in  man  may  have  an  opportunity  to  unfold. 
His  doctrines,  when  analyzed,  are  explosive;  if 


50       Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

practically  carried  out  would  be  revolutionary. 
He  is,  in  short,  the  true  socialist.  If  we  follow 
him  as  such,  if  we  work  out  his  intent,  we  shall 
have  individual  salvation,  but  we  shall  have  it  as 
a  consequent  of  social  redemption. 

There  may  be  shining  worlds  beyond  this. 
There  may  be  holy  cities  with  golden  streets. 
There  may  be  robes  of  righteousness  and  trees  of 
life.  What  we  need  to  do,  as  Christians,  is  to  take 
care  of  the  world  in  which  we  now  live,  build  first- 
class  holy  cities  here,  see  that  the  streets  are  well 
paved,  and  the  sewers  in  order,  put  fit  clothing  on 
the  backs  of  the  poor,  fill  the  mouths  of  the  hungry 
with  actual  bread,  make  the  hours  of  labor  min- 
imum, and  the  hours  of  personal  culture  maxi- 
mum, and  thus  weave  a  garment  of  civic,  social 
and  individual  righteousness  that  shall  stand  the 
test  of  this  world  or  any  other.  In  other  words, 
we  are  to  live  the  life  that  now  is — and  let  that 
which  is  to  come  take  care  of  itself. 

This  is  the  trend  of  the  modern  drift. 

It  is  an  endeavor  to  bring  the  church  down  out 
of  the  clouds,  place  it  on  the  level  of  human  ex- 
perience, meet  present  human  needs  in  practical 
ways,  and  establish  a  system  of  natural,  rational 
and  universal  ethics. 

And  yet — in  spite  of  this  widely  heralded  lib- 
eralism; in  spite  of  the  effort  to  accommodate 
itself  to  the  rationalism,  the  unbelief  and  down- 
right infidelity  of  the  hour ;  in  spite  of  the  deter- 
mination to  cut  loose  from  the  primaries  of  the 


Christianity  51 

first  century  and  ally  itself  with  the  fast-going 
advance  of  the  twentieth,  this  movement  in  the 
name  of  Christianity  has  not  succeeded  in  win- 
ning and  holding  the  multitude  either  to  a  per- 
sonal and  modified  Christ,  or  to  a  reorganized  and 
elastic  church. 

The  churches  in  which  it  flourishes ;  the  churches 
which  have  renounced  faith  in  the  supernatural 
and  miraculous;  the  churches  which  have  swung 
the  doors  wide  open  on  the  hinges  of  worldly  wis- 
dom and  easy  tolerance ;  the  churches  which  have 
substituted  natural  generation  for  supernatural 
regeneration,  evolution  instead  of  revolution,  the 
working  out  of  human  life,  instead  of  the  coming 
in  of  divine  life;  the  churches  which  teach  that 
man  is  to  go  up  and  take  hold  of  God,  instead  of 
God  coming  down  to  take  hold  on  man;  the 
churches  which  are  broad  enough  to  allow  men  of 
all  faiths,  and  men  of  no  faith  at  all,  to  occupy 
their  pulpits,  are  not  overcrowded,  nor  have 
righteousness  and  holiness  extraordinarily  in- 
creased in  their  neighborhood. 

On  the  contrary,  in  face  of  every  effort  to  con- 
ciliate the  naturalism  in  man,  men  look  upon  these 
churches,  and  the  Christianity  they  advocate,  with 
suspicion.  They  see  these  churches  have  their 
goods  still  marked  with  the  words,  "  super- 
natural, "  "  miraculous. M  It  is  true,  these  churches 
may  practically  put  such  goods  out  of  sight ;  even 
then,  men  will  not  be  attracted  beyond  the  expres- 
sion of  a  condescending  tolerance;  and  while  ad- 


52       Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

mitting,  as  they  will,  that  the  church  is  earnestly 
endeavoring  to  get  rid  of  its  ancient  incubus  of 
theology,  free  its  hands  and  take  hold  of  the  plow 
handle  of  progress,  ready,  if  needs  be,  to  drive  a 
furrow  deep  enough  to  bury  all  memories  of  primi- 
tive faith,  yet  will  they  turn  away  from  that  kind 
of  a  church  and  that  sort  of  Christianity,  with  the 
feeling  that  alRhis  action  on  the  part  of  the  church 
is  but  another  feeble  effort  at  competitive  moral- 
ity. They  will  turn  from  it  and  seek  their  own  or- 
ganizations wherein  no  issue  of  the  supernatural 
has  ever  been  raised ;  where  the  quasi  personality 
and  questionable  existence  of  an  unseen  God  are 
not  at  all  discussed ;  and  where  man  and  his  pres- 
ent life  are  the  only  subjects  deemed  worthy  of 
consideration. 

If  this  drift  as  thus  indicated  shall  continue 
another  ten  years,  and  enlist  the  support  and  open 
advocacy  of  leading  and  representative  thinkers 
in  the  church;  if  the  theological  seminaries  shall 
continue  to  turn  out  on  graduation  day,  with  their 
all  too  mechanical  regularity,  men  who  do  not  be- 
lieve in  the  virgin  birth,  who  find  no  real  reason 
why  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ  should  have  died  at  all, 
except  the  fatality  of  his  genius  that  he  was  too 
far  ahead  of  his  time  and  was  "caught  by  the 
whirling  wheel  of  the  world's  evil  and  torn  in 
pieces";  if  the  repudiation  of  the  Bible  as  the 
final  and  inerrant  revelation  of  God  for  this  age 
shall  continue  so  short  a  space  as  a  decade,  by 
that  time,  at  the  present  rate  of  development,  we 


Cheistiantty  53 

shall  have  not  only  a  very  modern  Christianity,  a 
Christianity  without  miracles,  without  even  a  hint 
of  the  supernatural,  but  a  Christianity  without 
spiritual  power  or  moral  authority,  standing  as  a 
delinquent  on  the  street  corners,  and  amid  the 
hurry  and  rush  of  more  vital  things,  begging  per- 
mission simply  to  exist. 

Over  against  this  modern  drift  and  its  ampli- 
tude of  failure  stands  the  phenomenal  success  of 
original  and  primitive  Christianity. 

And  yet,  the  conditions  which  confronted  this 
nascent  faith  were  appalling. 

It  was  the  era  of  materialism.  Force  was  the 
prime  minister,  self-gratification  the  supreme 
legislator.  Exaggerated  superstition  was  bal- 
anced by  decaying  faith.  It  was  a  time  of  co- 
ordinately  high  mental  activity,  an  intellectuality 
that  cynically  rejoiced  at  its  own  failure  to  solve 
the  riddle  of  the  universe,  maliciously  suggested 
new  difficulties,  raised  barriers  against  its  own 
research,  and  prostrating  itself  in  the  name  of 
mere  brutism,  worshipped  nature  as  the  ready 
panderer  to  its  worst  passions,  while  owning  it  as 
a  cruelly  smiling  and  pitiless  sphinx. 

The  one  hundred  and  twenty  men  and  women 
who  faced  the  Eoman  world  with  the  determination 
to  impinge  their  faith  upon  it,  seemed  the  most 
audaciously  unwise  of  all  forlorn  and  hopeless 
fanatics.  They  had  neither  wealth  nor  social 
standing.  Their  culture  was  at  zero,  their  knowl- 
edge  indifferent.     Localism   and   tradition    en- 


54       Chkist,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

vironed  them,  and  the  story  they  had  to  tell  was 
not  only  an  affront  to  the  course  of  nature,  but  a 
direct  repudiation  of  old  faiths  and  cherished  re- 
ligions. Itself  a  religio  illicit  a,  Christianity  chal- 
lenged governmental  law  and  invoked,  logically, 
the  keenest  persecution.  The  mountains  which 
surrounded  Jerusalem  were  not  so  high,  nor  so 
difficult  of  ascent,  as  the  prejudice  far  and  near 
over  which  they  needs  must  climb,  even  if  they 
would  gain  but  a  tolerated  hearing. 

Yet  they  went  forth !  and  so  preached,  that  they 
not  only  saved  and  transfigured  individuals,  but 
so  molded  and  transformed  society,  that  in  its 
every-day  achievements,  Christianity  itself  seemed 
like  a  miracle  to  astonished  and  silenced  on- 
lookers. 

Startlingly  enough  this  moulding  of  society,  this 
overturning  of  old  conditions — this  bringing  in  of 
the  radically  new,  so  that  their  enemies  said  of 
them  they  had  "turned  the  world  upside  down"; 
this  repudiation  of  brutality  and  the  exaltation  of 
unselfishness;  this  building  up  of  a  condition  in 
which  a  community  now  judged  itself  by  the 
standards  of  chastity,  righteousness  and  neigh- 
borly kindness;  this  renovation  of  whole  centres 
of  life  till  the  erstwhile  deserts  wherein  not  a 
flower  of  gentleness  had  bloomed,  now  blossomed 
as  gardens  of  delight,  watered  with  never-ceasing 
streams  of  brotherly  love — were  produced,  not  by 
an  appeal  to  society  itself,  not  by  denunciation  of 
laws  and  customs,  however  bad,  but  by  laying  hold 


Cheistianity  55 

of  a  human  soul,  estimating  it  in  value  by  the 
weight  of  a  whole  world,  and  changing  the  indi- 
vidual life. 

This  was  the  triumph  of  original  and  primitive 
Christianity. 

In  view  of  such  a  triumph  and  the  unqualified 
failure  of  the  modern  drift  which  claims  the  name 
of  Christianity,  it  should  seem  a  perfectly  legiti- 
mate and  altogether  pertinent  question  to  ask, 

"What  is  Christianity ?" 

The  answer  is  given  by  the  apostle  Paul  in  his 
second  letter  to  Timothy,  his  son  in  the  faith,  the 
preacher  of  his  own  ordination.    He  says: 

"Our  Saviour  Jesus  Christ  .  .  .  has  abolished  death 
and  brought  life  and  immortality  to  light  through  the 
Gospel."  (2  Timothy  1 :  10.) 

According  to  this  declaration,  the  Gospel  is  the 
good  news  that  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ  came  into 
the  world  to  accomplish  three  things — abolish 
death,  bring  in  a  new  life  and  reveal  immortality. 
As  the  Gospel  is  the  heart  beat  of  Christianity, 
then  the  three  things  which  proclaim  its  constitu- 
ent and  objective  characteristic  are: 

The  abolition  of  death. 

The  gift  of  a  new  life. 

Immortality. 

First — The  abolition  of  death. 

Death  is  a  black  fact.  It  is  the  shadow  the  sun 
never  penetrates,  the  robber  who  steals  the  treas- 
ure more  precious  than  gold,  the  guest  who  never 
waits  to  be  invited,  the  intruder  who  feels  at  home 


56       Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

whether  in  palace  or  in  cot,  has  no  respect  of 
persons,  and  lays  his  hand  with  equal  familiarity 
on  the  king  npon  his  throne,  or  the  tramp  by  the 
wayside,  saying  "come"  to  the  sick,  "tarry  not" 
to  the  well,  is  sure  of  the  old,  and  revels  like  a 
reaper  in  the  harvest  of  the  young.  It  breaks  the 
plans  and  disorganizes  the  relations  of  life;  and 
then,  like  a  coarse  comedian  or  a  heartless  satirist, 
compels  those  who  survive  to  turn  away  from  the 
memory  of  their  dead,  reorganize  their  lives  and 
live  on  as  though  those  who  once  lived  with  them 
and  formed  an  intimate  part  of  their  daily  experi- 
ence had  never  existed. 

Unless  God  himself  shall  intervene,  death  is  the 
certain  end  of  the  longest  life. 

Side  by  side  with  the  certainty  of  death  are  two 
things  which  give  it  emphasis :  the  brevity  of  life 
and  its  uncertainty. 

How  brief  it  is !  what  are  sixty  or  seventy  years 
as  measured  by  hopes  and  fears,  by  splendor  of 
genius,  by  forecasts  that  outreach  the  ages,  by 
thoughts  that  climb  and  climb  with  ease  to  the 
infinite,  by  energy  of  mind,  which,  rising  superior 
to  the  combined  hindrances  of  every  day,  is  always 
peering  beyond  the  last  endeavor,  and  stretching 
itself  towards  unbroken  continuance,  cries,  "What 
next?"  Extract  from  the  allotted  time  of  three 
score  years  and  ten,  the  puling  days  of  infancy, 
the  immature  years  of  youth,  the  hours  of  inde- 
cision as  to  the  route  to  take,  the  right  profession 
to  follow;  take  the  hours  given  to  eating  and 


Christianity  57 

drinking  (that  eating  and  drinking  which  in  spite 
of  the  glamor  we  throw  about  it  is  simply  repair- 
ing the  mechanical  waste  and  renewing  the  chem- 
ical energy  that  will  enable  ns  to  go  on  a  little 
while  and  a  little  way  farther) ;  take  out  the  time 
spent  in  sleep — in  practical  nonentity — and  the 
remainder  is  a  pitiful  handful  of  years,  so  few, 
that  to  number  them  seems  like  a  mathematical 
mockery,  like  numerical  trifling. 

And  the  uncertainty  of  life!  What  man  is  he 
who  can  assure  himself  of  ten  days?  In  that  time 
he  may  die,  be  buried  and  be  forgotten  by  the 
world  that  scarcely  heard  the  tolling  of  his  funeral 
bell,  and  had  no  time  to  stay  and  hear  the  falling 
of  the  grave  clods  upon  the  coffin  lid. 

This  emphasis  of  brevity  and  uncertainty  has 
affected  men  more  or  less  from  the  beginning.  In 
the  hour  when  Christianity  was  born  it  affected 
them  well  nigh  unto  delirium.  So  brief  was  the 
vision  of  life,  so  tumultuous  its  incidents,  so  con- 
scious were  men  of  its  uncertainty,  that  they 
played  with  it  as  gamblers  throw  dice.  It  be- 
came cheap,  cheaper  than  the  ground  in  which 
their  bodies  were  so  soon  to  be  laid;  and  in  de- 
rision of  its  cheapness  they  built  great  monuments 
to  hold  their  scattered  dust,  monuments  that 
should  outlast  by  centuries  their  latest  breath; 
with  light  laughter  they  rode  past  these  chiselled 
tombs  and  scorned  themselves  as  the  builders  of 
a  longevity  their  own  being  could  never  know. 

This  fact  of  death  is  impressing  men  now. 


58       Chkist,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

In  proportion  as  life  increases  in  knowledge; 
in  proportion  as  men  become  masters  of  nature's 
forces;  in  proportion  as  tliey  measure  the  uni- 
verse, make  daily  incursions  therein,  and  bring 
back  always  some  conquered  thing,  some  new  dis- 
covery as  a  tribute  to  the  limitlessness  of  mind, 
in  this  proportion  the  unequal  brevity  and  the  dis- 
integrating uncertainty  of  life,  lead  men  to  ask 
with  more  and  more  insistence,  whether,  after  all, 
it  is  worth  while.  Is  it  worth  while  to  carry  bur- 
dens which  force  us  to  look  down  into  the  dust 
of  the  highway,  and  not  up  and  out  to  the  wider 
landscape  ?  Is  it  worth  while  to  put  so  much  force 
of  soul  and  spirit,  brain  and  heart  into  things 
from  which  we  may  be  summoned  without  a  mo- 
ment's notice?  Is  it  worth  while  to  live,  and  then 
go  to  pieces  through  the  effort  at  living,  live  on 
day  after  day  like  a  machine  out  of  gear  (held 
together  oftentimes  only  by  the  surgeon's  skill), 
then  break  down  completely,  give  a  final  sigh  and 
be  hurried  away  to  add  a  lot  of  useless  fragments 
to  the  already  accumulated  scrap  heap  of  the  still 
more  useless  graveyard? 

Into  this  emphasis  of  brevity  and  uncertainty, 
there  enters  another  element  which  increasingly 
raises  the  question — "Is  it  worth  while?" 

That  added  element  is  the  silence  of  the  grave. 

The  grave  is  terribly  silent. 

You  can  hear  the  gravel  rattling  out  of  the 
grave  digger's  shovel  with  a  thud  upon  the  coffin 
lid ;  or,  you  can  hear  the  crunching,  jarring  sound 


Cheistianity  59 

as  the  casket  is  slid  into  its  place  in  the  receiving 
vault,  and  you  can  hear  the  turn  of  the  key  and 
the  snap  of  the  bolt  as  the  gate  or  door  of  the 
sepulchre  is  shut  and  locked. 

You  may  stand  above  the  simple  mound  of  the 
churchyard,  in  front  of  some  monumental  shaft, 
or  before  the  sculptured  urn;  it  may  be  the  dust 
of  a  king,  a  scholar,  or  some  nameless  beggar 
which  is  heaped  within — the  silence  will  be  un- 
broken— except  by  the  sound  of  your  own  voice  as 
you  ask: 

"Where  are  they?  What  are  they?  ABE 
they?" 

Although  the  sun  may  be  shining  in  full  splen- 
dor over  row  after  row  of  graves,  no  light  will  be 
there  in  which  to  read  the  answer  to  your  ques- 
tions. 

Instead  of  light  there  will  be  thick  darkness 
upon  the  graves,  and  gross  darkness  within. 

Men  peer  into  this  darkness.  There  is  no  vision 
— no  speech — and  they  ask:  "Is  it  worth  while 
to  toil,  to  labor,  to  accumulate,  to  make  great  ad- 
vance in  knowledge,  to  build  higher  every  day  the 
conning  towers  of  science,  and  then  leaving  these 
high  points  of  achievement,  enter  into  that  realm 
where  no  surveyor's  chain  has  ever  measured  the 
extent,  where  no  geographer  has  ever  named  a 
headland,  and  where  the  one  supreme  fact  that 
meets  us  on  the  threshold  is  ignorance — a  black, 
blinding,  all-pervading  ignorance  as  to  the  next 
moment  after  death;  so  that  at  the  end  of  our 


60       Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

reasoning,  deduction  and  amplification,  the  one 
thing  remaining  to  the  scholar  and  the  fool  alike 
concerning  death  is  a  gness,  a  gness  in  which  the 
wish  of  existence  is  father  to  the  thought,  but 
where  the  hope  of  to-morrow  is,  easily,  the  despair 
of  to-day. 

With  life  so  brief,  so  uncertain,  and  ending  in 
the  starless  night  of  silence,  men  in  one  form  of 
utterance  or  another  are,  in  substance,  calling  to 
each  other  and  saying,  "Let  us  eat  and  drink — 
for  to-morrow  we  die." 

Thus  the  contemplation  of  death  and  its  im- 
partial and  unprejudiced  analysis  leads  to  a  belief 
in  materialism  and  a  greater  or  less  surrender  to 
mere  sensualism;  for,  if  men  cannot  go  up  they 
will  go  down ;  if  they  cannot  live  in  the  spirit,  they 
will  grovel  in  the  flesh. 

What  then  shall  we  say  concerning  this  fact 
of  death! 

Shall  we  say  it  is  a  part  of  nature's  economy — 
as  legitimate  as  birth!  Because  we  know  nothing 
of  any  pre-existent  state  and  are  content  to  go 
forward  in  life,  shall  we  now  balk  and  hesitate  to 
discharge  our  functions  or  meet  our  opportuni- 
ties, because  we  have  no  evidence  of  an  after  ex- 
istence! 

Is  death  really  natural! 

Absolutely  it  is  not! 

The  whole  being  of  man  revolts  against  it, 
morally,  intellectually  and  organically.  Every 
law  of  nature  in  man  is  against  it.    Pain  and  suf- 


Christianity  61 

f  ering  are  its  protest.  To  say  that  it  is  as  natural 
as  birth  is  to  be  guilty  of  pure  bathos;  even  the 
worm  crushed  and  quivering  denies  the  sentiment. 
Schwann,  the  author  of  the  cellular  theory,  says : 
"I  really  do  not  know  why  we  die." 

There  is  no  reason  in  nature. 

The  process  which  renews  the  body  every  seven 
years — so  far  as  any  law  in  nature  shows — might 
go  on  indefinitely ;  there  is  no  reason  in  itself  why 
it  should  cease,  and  the  soul  within  is  never  con- 
scious of  the  added  years.  No  one  ever  thinks 
of  asking,  "Why  do  we  live?"  Always,  and  in- 
voluntarily, we  ask,  "Why  do  we  die?"  Always 
we  are  seeking  to  continue  life,  inventing  some- 
thing to  make  it  immune  from  death.  To  live, 
therefore,  is  natural.  Not  to  live  is  unnatural. 
Being  unnatural,  it  is  an  interference  with  nature. 
An  interference  with  nature  is  superior  to  nature. 
That  which  is  an  interference  of  and  superior 
to  nature  is  a  direct  imposition  upon  nature. 
An  imposition  upon  nature  could  not  be  possible 
without  the  permission  and  will  of  God.  If  God 
allows  and  wills  it,  then  the  imposition  is  for 
cause ;  being  such,  it  is  a  judicial  act,  a  judgment, 
and  becomes,  necessarily,  a  penalty.  Penalty 
stands  for  violated  law.  Violated  law  is  trans- 
gression. Transgression  is  sin.  Sin,  in  final  anal- 
ysis, is  lawlessness,  and  lawlessness  is  treason 
against  Jehovah.  Death  is,  therefore,  an  impo- 
sition of  God,  and  is  his  penalty  against  the 
treason  of  sin. 


62       C heist,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

This,  then,  is  the  explanation  of  death — it  is  the 
penalty  of  sin. 

This  is  the  definition  which  Christianity  gives — 
as  it  is  written:  "By  one  man  sin  entered  into  the 
world,  and  death  by  sin ;  and  so  death  passed  upon 
all  men."  (Eomans  5:12.) 

Again  it  is  written : 

"It  is  appointed  nnto  men  once  to  die."  (He- 
brews 9:27.) 

In  thus  determining  and  defining  death,  Chris- 
tianity reveals  both  its  essence  and  its  mission; 
for,  through  its  Gospel,  Christianity  brings  the 
good  news  that  the  issue  of  sin  and  death  as  be- 
tween God  and  man  has  been  settled  by  our  Lord 
Jesus  Christ ;  that  he  has  settled  it  perfectly  and 
forever  according  to  the  terms  of  divine  righteous- 
ness by  dying  as  a  sacrifice  for  sin  and  as  a  sub- 
stitute for  sinners. 

In  order  to  be  a  substitute  it  was  necessary 
that  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ  should  be  a  sinless 
man;  otherwise,  his  death  would  be  only  his  own 
execution  under  the  penalty  of  sin,  and  could  not 
avail  either  for  himself  or  others.  None  of 
Adam's  race  is  sinless;  a  sinless  person  must  be 
of  another  race.  To  be  of  another  race  and  be 
human  would  require  a  new  creation  and  would  be 
a  new  and  distinct  humanity. 

Our  Lord  Jesus  Christ  was  sinless.  He  was, 
therefore,  of  a  new  and  distinct  humanity.  In  in- 
carnation, God  did  not  take  the  humanity  of  Adam 
into  union  with  himself,  the  humanity  of  our  Lord 


Christianity  63 

Jesus  Christ  was  the  repudiation  of  the  humanity 
of  Adam.  By  that  incarnation  God  was  saying: 
'  '  I  have  tried  the  old  humanity.  I  find  nothing  in 
it  that  responds  to  my  claims.  At  its  best  it  is 
sinful,  only  sinful  and  fit  for  judgment — the  end 
of  all  flesh  is  come  before  me — and  that  end  is 
death.' ' 

The  humanity  of  Christ  is,  therefore,  not  an 
evolution,  but  a  new  creation;  it  is  not  an  invi- 
tation to  the  natural  man,  but  a  condemnation  of 
him.  It  does  not  say  to  him,  "  Follow  me,  imitate 
me  and  you  will  be  like  me ' ' ;  it  says :  ' '  I  am  from 
above,  ye  are  from  below.  I  am  from  heaven  and 
God — ye  are  from  the  earth.  My  humanity  is  as 
distinct  from  yours  as  the  heavens  are  from  the 
earth. ' ' 

Such  a  man  is  not  an  example,  a  copy  to  be  set 
before  men. 

And  never,  not  once,  do  the  apostles  so  set  him 
before  the  natural  man.  Always  they  set  him  be- 
fore the  natural  man  as  the  man  who  came  into  the 
world — not  to  live  as  an  example — but  to  die  as  a 
sacrifice  for  men ;  as  one  who  was  fit  to  die  because 
he  was  free  from  the  stain  and  penalty  of  sin. 

But  in  order  that  the  death  of  Christ  should  be 
of  infinite  value,  he  must  himself  be  an  infinite 
person.  The  value  of  a  deed  depends  upon  the 
person  who  does  it.  The  quality  resides  not  alone 
in  the  act,  but  in  the  actor.  The  value  of  the  death 
of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ  is  not  to  be  measured 
by  its  duration,  but  by  himself — by  what  he  was 


64       Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

in  himself;  it  does  not  depend  upon  the  length  of 
time  in  which  as  a  substitute  he  suffered  the  pun- 
ishment of  those  whose  place  he  was  taking,  but 
the  essential  quality  of  his  person.  Did  our  Lord 
suffer  but  a  moment  of  time  on  the  cross,  the  value 
of  his  suffering  as  a  satisfaction  to  the  law,  gov- 
ernment and  being  of  God  would  be  infinite. 

An  infinite  person  is  God. 

Always  as  such  do  the  apostles  present  our  Lord 
Jesus  Christ.  Their  testimony  to  his  deity  rings 
out  like  the  blast  of  far-sounding  trumpets.  In 
terms  that  are  precise,  and  so  strong  and  clear 
that  he  who  runs  may  read,  they  proclaim  that 
he  is  God  of  God,  very  God  of  very  God. 

As  God  the  Son,  in  co-operation  with  God  the 
Father  and  God  the  Spirit,  he  who  is  presented 
to  us  as  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  took  a  cell  from 
the  substance  of  the  virgin  Mary,  made  it  a  mould 
and  with  generating  power  wrought  from  it  a  real 
humanity — a  new  and  distinct  humanity — and 
united  it  to  his  eternal  personality;  so  that  he 
stands  forth  as  the  eternal  God  endowed  with  a 
human  nature — with  two  natures,  human  and  di- 
vine, in  one  body  and  one  person  forever — the 
infinite  God-man. 

Never  do  the  apostles  present  him  as  a  mere 
man.  They  present  his  humanity  as  the  back- 
ground for  his  deity.  His  humanity  in  its  most 
literal  revelation  is  always  declared  by  them  to 
be  the  revelation  and  the  manifestation  of  God. 
Never  do  the  apostles  attempt  to  reason  about  the 


Chbistianity  65 

incarnation,  with  superb  affirmation  and  sublime 
dignity  they  declare,  "  Without  controversy,  great 
is  the  mystery  of  godliness ;  God  was  manifest  in 
the  flesh." 

And  it  is  this  God  whom  Christianity  presents 
as  coming  down  from  the  heaven  of  glory,  and 
clothing  himself  with  a  new,  a  distinct,  but  a  mor- 
tal humanity  in  which  to  die  as  an  infinite  substi- 
tute for  guilty  men,  that  through  death,  he  might 
abolish  death  for  men. 

Having  died  as  a  sacrificial  substitute,  death 
considered  as  a  penalty,  and  the  guilt  and  demerit 
of  sin  which  induced  the  penalty,  have  been  set 
aside  for  all  for  whom  his  substitution  avails. 

Nor  does  Christianity  leave  us  long  in  doubt  as 
to  those  for  whom  the  substitution  obtains.  In  full 
and  precise  statement  of  doctrine  it  tells  us  that 
this  substitution  is  on  the  behalf  of,  and  for,  all 
who  individually  claim  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ  on 
the  cross  as  a  personal  sacrifice  for  sin,  and  who 
by  faith  offer  him  to  God  as  the  sacrifice  and  sin 
offering  which  God  himself  has  provided. 

Thus  it  follows,  that  for  every  believer — death 
as  a  penalty  has  been  abolished,  brought  to  nought. 

This  is  the  first  great  and  joyous  proclamation 
of  Christianity,  Death  has  been  abolished  as  a 
penalty  for  every  believer. 

It  has  been  abolished  de  jure,  not  yet  de  facto. 

The  Christian  still  dies,  but  his  death  is  no 
longer  penal,  it  is  providential  and  provisional. 

In  the  hour  of  death  the  Christian  is  not  seized 


66       Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

as  a  culprit  and  hurried  away  to  execution.  On 
the  contrary,  when  the  hour  of  death  sounds  for 
him,  a  voice  inspired  from  heaven  assures  him 
that  he  has  reached  the  threshold  of  the  "far 
better ";  he  arises  and  " departs,' '  that  he  may  be 
"absent  from  his  home  in  this  body  and  present 
at  his  home  with  the  Lord.''  His  death  is  not  a 
defeat,  but  a  begun  victory,  and,  inasmuch  as  both 
soul  and  spirit  are  delivered  from  the  underworld 
and  the  shades  of  death,  he  has  the  assurance  that 
the  penalty  will  yet  be  completely  abolished  con- 
cerning his  body :  it  is  both  the  assurance  and  the 
prophecy  of  it. 

Christianity  is,  then,  primarily,  the  good  news, 
and  the  doctrinal  demonstration,  that  death  as  a 
judicial  sentence  has  been  abolished  for  the 
Christian. 

But  Christianity  is  something  more  than  the 
abolition  of  death — it  is — 

Second — The  bringing  in  and  revelation  of  life. 

Through  the  Gospel,  we  are  told,  life  has  been 
brought  to  light. 

In  the  nature  of  the  case  this  cannot  mean  nat- 
ural life. 

There  was  no  necessity  that  it  should  be  brought 
into  light. 

It  has  never  been  in  darkness. 

It  is  manifest  everywhere.  Light  and  life  are 
synonymous. 

There  is  not  a  condition  in  which  in  some  form 
or  other  it  does  not  exist.    While  one  class  of  life 


Christianity  67 

may  not  live  in  a  certain  environment,  there  are 
other  forms  to  which  this  environment  would  be 
as  a  hotbed  for  their  production.  Life  is,  indeed, 
universal,  and  may  be  said  to  be  omnipresent.  You 
will  find  it  in  the  deepest  depths  of  earth,  and  in 
the  highest  reaches  of  air.  It  expands  on  the 
mountain  top,  it  dwells  in  the  sea ;  it  is  organized 
in  the  infusoria,  it  exists  in  the  infinitesimal,  and 
reveals  itself  at  last,  in  the  beauty  of  woman  and 
the  strength  of  man. 

As  natural  life  has  always  thus  been  in  evi- 
dence ;  as  it  has  never  been  in  the  dark  at  all,  then 
the  life  which  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ  has  brought 
to  light  is  not  natural  life — it  is  new  life — a  life 
unknown  to  the  world  before. 

It  does  not  come  from  the  natural  man.  It  is 
not  produced  by  natural  generation.  It  comes 
from  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ  and  by  supernatural 
generation.  It  did  not  come  from  him  while  he 
walked  the  earth.  At  no  time  during  his  earthly 
career  did  a  human  being  receive  it.  The  disciples 
who  followed  him — he  who  leaned  upon  his  breast 
at  supper  and  was  the  disciple  whom  Jesus  loved 
— knew  nothing  of  it.  This  new  and  unique  life 
was  brought  into  the  light  only  when  that  light 
shone  from  his  empty  grave.  He  gave  it  forth 
and  communicated  it  to  men  only  when,  as  the 
risen  man,  he  ascended  up  on  high.  It  comes  from 
him  as  the  second  man,  as  the  last  Adam,  that 
Adam  to  whom  the  first  was  only  as  the  clay  model 
to  the  completed  statue,  as  concept  is  to  consum- 


68       Chbist,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

mation.  It  comes  from  him  who  is  both  God  and 
man,  in  one  body  and  one  person  forever;  and 
who,  as  such,  is  the  head  and  beginning  of  the  new 
creation  of  God. 

By  him  it  is  communicated  to  those  who  own 
him  as  their  atoning  sacrifice. 

The  instrument  is  the  word  of  the  Gospel. 

The  agent  is  the  Holy  Spirit. 

The  Word  is  preached — it  falls  into  the  heart 
of  the  believer  as  seed  into  the  ground. 

The  Spirit  quickens  it — the  new  life  is  ger- 
minated. 

That  new  life  is  the  life  and  nature  of  the  risen 
one,  our  great  God  and  Saviour  Jesus  Christ,  the 
man  in  the  glory;  it  is  the  mind  of  him  who  is 
called  Christ,  and  it  is,  therefore,  in  final  term — 
"the  mind  of  Christ.' ' 

It  is  wrought,  not  in  the  soul,  but  in  the  spirit 
of  the  believer. 

By  no  slow  process  does  it  enter — this  life  of 
the  risen  Lord — but  by  absolute  fiat — the  fiat  of 
him  who  said — ' '  Lazarus,  come  forth. ' ' 

It  is  fiat  life. 

Its  entrance  into  a  human  being  is  as  light 
flashes  into  darkness. 

It  is  as  instantaneous  as  when  God  of  old  said, 
' '  Let  there  be  light, ' '  and  light  burst  over  a  world 
cataclysmically  fallen  into  chaos. 

It  is  as  transforming  as  when  morning  awakens 
the  sleeping  earth  and  hill  and  dale,  river  and  sea, 
shine  forth  in  their  beauty. 


Christianity  69 

It  is  as  startling  as  when  Lazarus  himself,  obey- 
ing the  voice  of  his  Lord,  rose  from  the  dead  and 
came  forth. 

Behold  the  illustration  of  it. 

Here  is  a  man  who  grovelled  in  the  lowest 
animalism. 

He  was  a  husband  and  father.  What  a  hus- 
band !  and  what  a  father ! 

She  who  was  his  wife  fled  oftentimes  at  the  very 
sound  of  his  footsteps,  shivering  with  the  same 
fear,  as  though  he  who  had  solemnly  sworn  to  love 
and  protect  her,  were  a  mad  brute  intent  on  grati- 
fying his  own  fierce  lust,  and  ready  with  un- 
checked sensualism  to  trample  her  in  the  mire  of 
his  bestiality.  A  father,  whose  very  name  made 
the  cheeks  of  the  children  grow  white  and  their 
pulses  almost  to  cease  with  terror.  A  drunkard, 
who  drowned  in  his  cup,  not  only  wife  and  children 
and  home  and  all  outward  decency,  but  every  char- 
acteristic of  truth  and  honesty  and  manhood  of 
his  own  soul.  A  man,  who  through  self-indulgence 
and  the  incessant  yielding  to  unspeakable  desires, 
had  become  little  better  than  a  human  sewer, 
through  whom  the  slime  and  indescribable  filth  of 
fallen  and  degraded  humanity  found  its  un- 
hindered course.  A  human  being,  who  had  become 
a  lazar  spot,  a  walking  pest,  whose  inmost  thought 
rotted  and  putrified  his  own  mind;  and  whose 
words  without  license  were  a  poison  and  con- 
tagion to  every  one  whose  ears  caught  their  un- 
welcome sound. 


70       Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

Mark  the  change  in  that  man! 

The  wife  now  watches  at  the  door  with  a  glad- 
some smile  to  greet  his  return.  The  children,  who 
once  in  their  rags  trembled  with  fear,  now  clean 
and  wholesomely  clad,  and  gay  with  laughter, 
gather  at  his  knee,  the  moment  he  enters  his  home. 
He  is  himself  well  dressed.  He  holds  his  head 
erect,  his  eyes,  no  longer  bloodshot,  meet  your  gaze 
with  frank  and  open  glance.  His  tones  are  soft 
and  modulated,  his  speech  gentle.  The  Bible,  the 
one  book  he  always  hated,  is  his  constant  study. 
His  mouth  once  filled  with  cursings  that  might 
well  have  chilled  the  blood  to  hear,  now  give  utter- 
ance to  the  voice  of  prayer  and  earnest  thanks- 
giving. The  church  he  never  entered  and  always 
avoided  has  become  the  centre  around  which  the 
best  activities  of  his  life  are  continuously  moving. 
He  who  was  once  shunned,  despised  and  feared,  is 
now  honored  and  respected  of  all. 

The  man  has  been  transformed. 

Those  who  saw  him  in  former  days  and  see  him 
now  might  in  all  reason  ask,  "Is  this  he,  or  some 
other  man?" 

It  is  both  he  and  yet  another  man.  The  same 
person,  but  possessing  another  character. 

What  is  the  secret  of  it  all? 

Let  the  answer  be  graven  on  every  heart.  He  has 
received  a  new  life,  a  new,  a  pure,  a  holy  and  spir- 
itual life.  He  has  received  that  life  from  above, 
from  the  second  Adam,  the  Lord  in  heaven.  He  is 
now  a  twice-begotten  man. 


Christianity  71 

And  herein  is  the  glorious,  distinctive  feature 
of  Christianity  in  so  far  as  it  touches  a  human 
soul. 

To  that  soul  it  brings  the  good  news  that  a  new 
generation  is  possible;  the  good  news  that  any 
human  being  may  start  over.  The  good  news  that, 
no  matter  how  much  you  may  be  handicapped  by 
your  original  genesis ;  no  matter  what  the  terrific 
law  of  heredity  may  have  transmitted  to  you,  you 
may  be  generated  again.  In  a  moment,  in  the 
twinkling  of  an  eye,  you  may  have  a  genealogy 
that  shall  carry  your  name  above  the  proudest  of 
earth ;  a  genealogy  by  the  side  of  which  the  bluest 
blood  of  most  ancient  kings  shall  be  as  the  palest 
and  poorest  of  plebeian  stuff.  This  Gospel  of 
Christianity  brings  the  good  news  that  you  may 
receive  from  the  throne  of  God  life  from  God, 
as  directly  as  did  Adam  when  God  breathed  into 
his  nostrils  the  breath  of  life  and  man  became  a 
living  soul.  In  an  instant  you  may  be  recreated 
morally  and  spiritually,  and  have  in  you  all  the 
assets  which,  when  fully  capitalized  by  the 
grace  of  God,  shall  insure  your  sonship  with 
God  here,  making  you  master  over  every  dis- 
turbing and  disquieting  passion,  and  guarantee- 
ing to  you  an  eternal  entrance  into  the  endless 
inheritance  of  God,  wherein  you  shall  be,  indeed, 
the  heir  of  God  and  joint  heir  with  our  Lord 
Jesus  Christ.  In  short,  you  may  have  the 
bequeathed  ability  to  glorify  God  and  enjoy  him 
forever. 


72       Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

This  is  the  life  which  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ  has 
brought  to  light. 

The  Gospel  is  the  good  news  of  this  life  of  which 
the  life  giver  himself  has  said,  "I  came  that  ye 
might  have  life,  and  that  ye  might  have  it  more 
abundantly."  That  is  to  say:  "I  came  that  ye 
might  have  this  spiritual  life  and  have  it  without 
limit  here." 

And  this  Gospel  of  the  new  life  brought  to  light 
by  and  through  the  death  and  resurrection  of  our 
Lord  Jesus  Christ  is  one  of  the  elemental  facts 
and  forces  which  definitely  answers  the  question — 
"What  is  Christianity?" 

But  Christianity  is  something  more  than  the 
abolition  of  death  as  a  penalty  and  the  bringing 
in  of  a  new  and  spiritual  life.  Christianity  is 
through  its  Gospel — the  good  news  that — 

Third — Immortality  has  been  brought  to  light. 

The  word  here  translated  "immortality"  is  "in- 
corruption";  but  it  signifies  in  final  terms  the  fact 
of  immortality ;  for,  as  mortality  is  identified  with 
corruption  and  is  its  consequent,  so  immortality, 
which  is  the  opposite  of  mortality,  is  the 
consequence  of  incorruption  and  is  inseparable 
from  it. 

This  word  "immortality"  is  greatly  misunder- 
stood, and  almost  always  misapplied. 

It  is  continually  applied  to  the  soul.  It  is  a 
common  thing  to  hear  or  read  the  expression,  "im- 
mortal soul." 

The  truth  is,  that  phrase  cannot  be  found  in 


Christianity  73 

Holy  Scripture.  The  terms  are  misleading — their 
conjunction  is  false.  Applied  to  the  soul,  the 
word  "immortal"  is  a  misnomer.  Throughout 
Scripture  the  original  word  and  idea  relate  to  the 
body — never  otherwise.  The  word  "mortal"  is 
never  used  of  the  soul ;  you  never  read  in  Scrip- 
ture the  expression,  "mortal  soul."  You  will  find 
the  words  ' '  mortal  body. ' '  A  mortal  body  has  for 
its  opposite  an  "immortal  body."  A  mortal  body 
is  subject  to  corruption  and  death.  An  immortal 
body  is  incorruptible  and  not  subject  to  death — an 
immortal  body  can  never  die. 

The  mortal  body  is  the  scandal  of  the  race  and 
the  open  label  of  sin.  A  mortal  body  puts  us  in 
the  category  of  condemned  criminals  awaiting  exe- 
cution. The  scandal  is  not  only  moral,  but  or- 
ganic. To  be  filled  with  disease,  with  pestilence, 
with  fever,  and  then  die  and  the  body  turned  back 
to  its  component  parts — this  is  a  scandal  in  con- 
struction ;  as  much  a  scandal  as  when  a  house  not 
properly  built  falls  down ;  a  dead  body,  whether  of 
man  or  dog,  is  the  most  shameful  blot  on  the  face 
of  the  earth,  and  with  the  gaping  mouth  of  the 
graveyard,  justifies  the  estimate  and  the  declara- 
tion of  the  living  God,  that  death  is  an  "enemy," 
not  a  welcome  thing  like  birth  and  life — but  an 
enemy.  Such  a  scandal  is  it,  indeed,  that  when 
our  Lord  Jesus  Christ  came  to  the  grave  of 
Lazarus,  he  was  himself  moved  with  indignation ; 
for  the  words,  "groaning  within  himself,"  miss 
the  true  force.    The  Greek  verb  used  signifies  that 


74       Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

he  was  inwardly  rilled  with  indignation  and  a 
sense  of  outrage  at  the  sight  of  the  grave  and  the 
announcement  that  the  body  of  Lazarus  was  al- 
ready corrupt.  Whatever  groaning  came  from  his 
lips  and  whatever  tears  fell  from  his  eyes  as  he 
wept — these  were  his  protests  against  death  and 
the  grave;  for  he  recognized  this  dead  body  not 
only  as  due  to  the  penalty  of  sin,  but  as  the  work 
of  him  "who  had  the  power  of  death,  that  is,  the 
devil.' '  (Hebrews  2:14.) 

Even  though  the  Christian  as  to  soul  and  spirit 
be  delivered  from  death ;  even  though  he  does  not 
go  down  to  Hades,  but  at  death  is  safely  housed 
and  at  home  with  God  in  heaven — yet  the  fact  that 
this  body,  which  was  not  only  the  dwelling  place 
of  his  soul,  but  the  temple  and  shrine  of  the  Holy 
Spirit,  should  become  a  banquet  for  worms,  a 
thing  of  repulsive  decay,  a  residuum  of  forgotten 
dust,  is  a  scandal,  even  to  the  Christian,  and  gives 
emphasis  to  the  shame  of  death. 

The  Son  of  God  came  into  the  world  to  remove 
this  scandal. 

He  died  and  rose  again,  not  only  that  he  might 
have  power  and  authority  to  give  a  new  and  spir- 
itual life  to  men,  a  character  befitting  them  for 
the  high  things  of  God,  he  died  and  rose  again 
that  he  might  have  power  and  authority  to  give  an 
immortal  body  to  all  who  would  receive  from  him 
this  new  and  spiritual  life. 

He  brought  this  immortality  to  light  when  he 
rose  from  the  dead. 


Cheistianity  75 

He  brought  it  to  light  by  rising  from  the  dead 
in  the  body  in  which  he  had  died. 

If  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ  did  not  rise  from  the  dead 
in  the  body  in  which  he  died,  then  immortality  in  the 
New  Testament  sense  of  the  word  has  never  been 
brought  to  light. 

But  he  did  so  rise. 

He  made  that  clear  on  the  first  Sunday  night 
after  his  resurrection. 

The  disciples  were  gathered  together  in  the 
room. 

The  supper  table  was  spread. 

No  one  cared  to  eat. 

The  story  had  been  going  all  day  that  Jesus  had 
risen. 

The  women  said  so.  They  persisted  that  they 
had  seen  and  talked  with  him. 

Two  men  claimed,  also,  to  have  seen  him, 
walked,  talked  and  broken  bread  with  him,  that 
very  afternoon. 

The  disciples  did  not  believe  it. 

They  were  afraid  to  believe  it  lest  it  should 
prove  to  be  untrue. 

Then,  suddenly,  he  stood  in  the  midst. 

They  thought  it  was  his  ghost. 

This  was  a  proof  to  them  that  he  had  not  risen ; 
for  a  ghost  is  a  disembodied  thing. 

He  was  a  ghost — he  was  disembodied — there- 
fore he  had  not  risen. 

So  they  felt — each  one  of  them. 

They  did  not  say  it — but  they  thought  it. 


76       Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

He  knew  their  thoughts. 

He  asks  them  why  these  thoughts  arise  in  their 
hearts.    He  upbraids  them  for  their  unbelief. 

He  tells  them  plainly,  a  ghost  does  not  have  flesh 
and  bones. 

He  says,  "I  have  flesh  and  bones/' 

They  are  still  silent. 

Then  he  stretches  out  his  hands  towards  them. 
He  shows  them  his  feet. 

There  are  great  marks  in  them — there  is  around 
these  marks  as  the  stain  of  blood,  or  of  wounds 
whence  blood  had  flowed. 

Still  they  do  not  speak.  They  are  afraid  to 
believe;  it  is  too  good  to  be  true. 

He  says  to  them,  "Handle  me  and  see — take 
hold  of  my  feet — feel  me — examine  me  for  your- 
selves.'J 

They  are  as  immovable  and  speechless  as  men 
changed  into  stone. 

He  turns  upon  them  quickly  and  says,  "Have 
you  anything  to  eat1?" 

They  point  to  the  untasted  supper. 

Then  comes  the  climax. 

He  goes  to  the  table. 

He  sits  down. 

He  eats  before  them. 

It  is  of  record  that  he  did  eat  broiled  fish  and 
an  honeycomb. 

Either  this  is  the  worst  fable  ever  palmed  off 
on  the  church  of  Christ — on  the  credulity  of  aching 
human  hearts — or  it  is  the  truth  of  God. 


Christianity  77 

Call  it  the  truth  of  God — then  the  body  in  which 
our  Lord  Jesus  Christ  rose  was  the  body  in  which 
he  died. 

That  body,  stamped  and  sealed  with  the  stig- 
mata of  the  cross,  is  the  living,  quivering 
definition,  and  indisputable  demonstration  of 
immortality.  Immortality  is  the  living  again  in  a 
body  which  was  dead  and  dieth  no  more ;  or,  it  is 
the  change  of  the  body  in  which  we  now  live  into 
an  incorruptible,  glorious  body  which  shall  never 
die. 

In  that  body  which  he  raised  from  the  dead, 
and  which  never  saw  corruption,  our  Lord 
Jesus  Christ  now  sitteth  at  the  right  hand  of 
God. 

He  is  there  as  the  vision  and  standard  of  im- 
mortality. 

He  is  there  as  the  forerunner,  the  prototype,  the 
sample  and  prophecy  of  immortality  for  the 
Christian. 

Until  the  Christian  is  made  immortal  his  re- 
demption is  not  complete. 

The  Christian  who  dies  is  transported  to  heaven. 

His  estate  there  as  compared  to  this  is  "far 
better." 

But  "far  better' '  is  not  the  "best."  It  is  only 
a  comparative. 

The  superlative  requires  that  the  Christian  shall 
have  a  body.  Without  a  body  the  Christian  is 
neither  a  complete  human  being  nor  a  perfect  son 
of  God. 


78       Chkist,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

The  divine  ordination  is  "spirit,  soul,  and 
hody." 

Unless  the  Christian  receives  an  immortal  body 
the  victory  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ  over  death 
and  over  him  who  has  the  power  of  death  (that  is 
the  Devil)  is  not  complete. 

Satan  as  the  strong  man  armed  holds  the  goods 
and  keeps  them  secure  within  his  house. 

The  instrument  with  which  he  is  armed  is  the 
law.  That  law  which  requires  that  it  shall  be 
"appointed  unto  men  once  to  die."  The  goods 
are  the  bodies  of  the  saints,  and  the  house  is  the 
dark  and  dismal  grave. 

O  the  pitifulness  of  it!  that  our  Lord  Jesus 
Christ  should  possess  the  Christian  as  a  ghost  in 
heaven,  and  the  Devil  hold  his  blood-bought  and 
spirit-sealed  body  in  the  grave. 

A  risen  Christ  is  an  immortal  body,  surrounded 
by  disembodied  Christian  ghosts  in  heaven  for- 
ever— that  is  a  concept  too  hideously  grotesque 
to  consider. 

An  immortal  Christ  who  redeemed  his  own  body 
from  the  power  of  the  grave,  but  is  unable  to  de- 
liver the  bodies  of  those  for  whom  he  died — to 
think  it  is  blasphemy!  to  believe  it — impossible! 

If  the  Devil  be  the  strong  man  armed,  the  risen 
Lord  is  the  one  ' '  stronger  than  he, ' '  who  has  met 
and  equalled  all  the  demands  of  the  law,  and  by 
his  death  nullified  its  ultimate  power  over  the 
bodies  of  those  for  whom  he  died. 

In  the  very  nature  of  the  case,  then,  full  re- 


Christianity  79 

demption  requires  that  the  body  of  every  Chris- 
tian shall  be  delivered  from  the  grave,  and  that 
every  Christian,  whether  living  or  dead,  shall  be 
clothed  finally  with  an  immortal  body. 

This  is  the  great  objective  of  salvation — not  just 
to  save  men  from  vice  and  immorality  here;  not 
just  to  fit  them  with  an  antidote  against  the  poison 
of  sin;  or  give  them  an  impetus  to  holiness  and 
truth  for  a  few  brief  years  in  this  mortal  body, 
then  let  them  die  under  various  circumstances  of 
suffering  and  pain  and  be  carried  away  to  heaven 
to  live  there  as  attenuated,  invisible  ghosts  for- 
ever! 

O  no !  it  is  not  that ! 

It  is  true  men  are  to  be  saved  here  and  now 
in  such  moral  and  spiritual  fashion  as  that  each 
saved  person  should  make  the  world  sweeter  and 
better  and  nearer  to  God  for  living  in  it.  All  that 
is  true,  but  it  is  only  a  part  of  the  glorious  truth. 
The  supreme  objective — the  ultima  thule  of  re- 
demption— is — 

Immortality — the  Christian  eternally  and  incor- 
ruptibly  embodied. 

And  this  immortality,  this  eternal  embodiment, 
is  to  be  accomplished  for  every  Christian.  The 
fact  that  death  has  been  abolished  officially  as  a 
penalty  for  the  Christian  is  a  demonstration  that 
abolition  of  death  means  abolition  for  the  whole 
Christian ;  as  a  whole  or  complete  Christian  must 
have  a  body,  then  the  abolition  of  death  for  the 
Christian  means  abolition  of  death  from  the  body. 


80       Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

The  abolition  of  death  from  the  body  is  immor- 
tality; by  virtue,  then,  of  the  abolition  of  death, 
immortality  is  assured  to  every  Christian. 

Not  one  will  be  forgotten  even  though  centuries 
may  have  broken  into  dust  above  his  grave. 

This  immortality  will  be  brought  to  pass  by  him 
who  is  the  Eesurrection  and  the  Life. 

It  will  be  brought  to  pass  at  the  Coming  of  our 
Lord  Jesus  Christ. 

He  is  coming  to  this  world  again.  By  every  law 
of  necessity  he  must  come.  He  is  coming  to  com- 
plete redemption,  to  bring  on  the  capstone  amid 
shoutings  of  " grace,  grace  unto  it." 

He  will  raise  the  dead  who  have  fallen  asleep  in 
his  name.  He  will  change  the  living  ones  who  are 
his  at  his  coming.  He  will  make  the  body  of  each 
incorruptible,  deathless,  immortal,  like  unto  his 
own  glorious  body,  as  it  is  written: 

"We  shall  be  like  him;  for  we  shall  see  him  as 
he  is."  (1  John  3:2.) 

And  again  it  is  written : 

We  are  citizens  of  a  country  which  is  in  heaven ; 
from  whence  also  we  look  for  the  Saviour,  the 
Lord  Jesus  Christ;  who  shall  change  the  body  of 
our  humiliation,  that  it  may  be  fashioned  like  unto 
the  body  of  his  glory,  according  to  the  working 
whereby  he  is  able  even  to  subdue  all  things  unto 
himself."  (Philippians  3:  20,  21.) 

At  the  last  he  will  regenerate  the  earth.  He  will 
make  it  over.  He  will  make  all  things  new.  He 
will  set  this  race  of  redeemed  immortals  within  it. 


Christianity  81 

Perfectly  recovered  from  the  spoliation  of  sin  and 
death,  they  shall  inhabit  it  forever.  God  shall  get 
his  own  world  again. 

Paradise  lost  shall  become  paradise  regained, 
and  God's  purpose  to  make  man  his  constitutional, 
governmental,  moral  and  spiritual  image  shall  be 
fulfilled.  Man  shall  be  God  incarnate,  and  incar- 
nation shall  be  seen  to  be  the  beginning  and  the 
ending  of  the  purpose  of  God. 

This  is  the  consummation  to  which  Christianity 
leads  us — a  perfect  race  of  immortal  beings  in  a 
perfect  world,  a  perfect  world  in  which  no  man 
shall  say,  "I  am  sick";  where  sin  is  unknown; 
where  the  funeral  bell  does  not  toll,  and  a  grave  is 
never  dug.    Where  God  is  all  in  all. 

This  is  the  hope  and  the  ultimate  Christianity 
sets  before  us.  Not  once  in  all  its  record  does  it 
offer  us  heaven  or  bid  us  prepare  for  it  as  the 
ultimate,  but  always  it  exhorts  us  to  look  for  and 
wait  patiently  for  immortality  and  glory  at  the 
Coming  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ. 

This  is  the  Christianity  of  the  primitive  cen- 
turies. 

This  is  the  Christianity  of  the  New  Testament. 

It  is  the  Christianity  that  fully  met  the  needs 
of  men. 

It  met  the  needs  of  men  who  gave  themselves 
up  to  unrestrained  passion,  to  the  gluttony  of 
every  appetite;  who  lounged  away  their  day  in 
cool  marble  halls,  or  leaned  half  drunken  from  the 
cushioned  seats  of  the  amphitheatre,  while  the 


82       Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

sands  of  the  arena  were  reddened  with  human 
blood  to  give  them  a  holiday.  Look  at  them  there. 
They  passed  their  unsatisfying  hours  in  idle  jest, 
wreathed  themselves  with  freshly  plucked,  but 
swiftly  fading  flowers,  drowned  their  senses  from 
moment  to  moment,  still  deeper  in  the  spiced  and 
maddening  wines,  gave  unbridled  freedom  to  their 
lust ;  and  then,  at  close  of  day,  in  the  splendor  of 
the  sinking  sun,  went  forth  to  cool  their  fevered 
brows  in  the  Campagna's  freshening  but  deadly 
air,  and  drove  with  furious  pace  and  brutal 
laughter  along  the  Appian  way  between  rows  of 
monumental  tombs  whose  chiselled  epitaphs  told 
the  hopeless  end  of  human  life;  then  back  again 
they  drove  with  still  more  reckless  haste  to  spend 
the  night  in  wild  debauch  and  meet  the  gray  dawn- 
ing of  another  day  with  its  mocking  routine  and 
disgust.  Loathing  their  very  joys,  revolting  at 
their  own  gratification,  these  men  asked:  "Is  there 
nothing  better  than  this,  that  we  drain  the  cup 
of  pleasure  to  the  dregs,  open  our  veins,  watch 
the  life  blood  ebb  away,  and  laugh,  and  mingle  our 
laughter  with  curses  that  so  cheap  and  easy  an 
ending  should  have  cost  so  much  to  reach  V9 

0  the  woe,  the  horror,  the  emptiness,  and  the 
crying,  agonizing  need  of  lives  like  these. 

And  Christianity  fully  and  richly  met  the  need 
of  lives  like  these. 

It  met  the  needs  of  men  who  in  the  midst  of  an 
environment  of  the  flesh,  with  the  wild  beast  of 
appetite  struggling  within,  now  and  then  had  long- 


Christianity  83 

ings  for  a  power  that  should  enable  them  to  put 
their  feet  upon  the  neck  of  passion. 

It  met  the  needs  of  men  who,  standing  above 
their  dead,  asked  again  the  old  and  oft-repeated 
question  of  Job,  "If  a  man  die,  shall  he  live 
again  ? ' ' 

Christianity  met  all  these  needs. 

Through  crowded  streets  of  populous  towns 
and  lonely  lanes  of  silent  villages,  in  lordly  palace 
and  before  straw-thatched  hovels,  to  listening 
throngs  and  wayside  hearers,  it  rang  forth  its 
wondrous  proclamation. 

It  told  men  that  a  man  had  been  here  who  had 
proven  himself  stronger  than  death  and  mightier 
than  the  grave ;  a  man  who  had  burst  the  bars  of 
death  asunder,  spurned  the  sepulchre  wherein 
human  hands  had  laid  his  body,  had  ascended  up 
on  high,  and  now,  from  heaven's  throne,  had 
power  to  impart  to  men  a  life  that  hated  sin,  re- 
joiced in  virtue,  could  make  each  moment  of 
earth's  existence  worth  while,  and  carried  within 
it  the  assurance  and  prophecy  of  eternal  felicity. 

Far  and  wide,  over  land  and  sea,  it  rang  the 
tidings  that  this  perfect  life  might  be  had  by  king 
or  cotter,  by  freeman  or  slave,  without  money  and 
without  price,  for  so  simple  a  thing  as  genuine 
faith  in,  and  open  confession  of,  him  who  had  died 
and  risen  again. 

With  rich,  exultant  note  it  announced  that  he 
who  as  very  God  had  clothed  himself  with  a  new 
and  distinct  humanity,  who  had  loved  men  unto 


84       Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

death  and  died  for  them,  had  not  forgotten  the 
earth  wherein  he  had  suffered,  his  own  grave  from 
whence  he  had  so  triumphantly  risen,  nor  yet  the 
graves  of  those  who  had  confessed  his  name ;  but, 
on  the  contrary,  was  coming  back  in  personal 
glory  and  with  limitless  power  to  raise  the  dead, 
transfigure  the  living,  make  them  immortal,  and  so 
change  this  earth  that  it  should  no  longer  be  a 
swinging  cemetery  of  the  hopeless  dead,  but  the 
abiding  home  of  the  eternally  living  sons  of  God. 

Men  held  like  Laocoon  in  the  winding  coils  of 
sinuous  and  persistent  sin,  and  who  vainly  sought 
to  escape  from  its  slowly  crushing  embrace,  heard 
the  good  news  and  turned  their  faces  towards  the 
rising  hope  of  present  deliverance. 

Men  standing  in  the  shadow  of  the  tombs  and 
waiting  their  turn  smiled  until  their  smiles  turned 
into  joyous  laughter  as  they  said:  "If  we  die,  we 
shall  live  again — the  grave  shall  not  always  win 
its  victory  over  us." 

Do  you  wonder  the  world  stopped,  listened,  and 
that  multitudes  turned  and  followed  after? 

Do  you  wonder  that  this  Christianity  of  the 
primitive  centuries  triumphed  so  phenomenally? 

This  is  the  Christianity  we  need  to  preach  to- 
day. 

It  is  full  of  a  great  body  of  doctrine. 

It  is  full  of  the  supernatural. 

Miracle  and  miraculous  are  woven  into  its  text- 
ure from  beginning  to  end.  You  cannot  touch  it, 
or  handle  it,  or  look  at  it  from  any  angle  of  vision 


Christianity  85 

that  it  does  not  suggest  the  miraculous.  The  mo- 
ment the  miracle  is  out  of  it  it  is  no  longer  the 
Christianity  of  the  first  century,  it  is  not  the 
Christianity  of  the  New  Testament — the  Chris- 
tianity that  has  a  miraculous  Christ  for  its  centre 
and  the  miracle  of  an  infinite  God  for  its  en- 
vironment. 

A  Christianity  of  doctrine ! 

A  Christianity  of  miracle ! 

And  why  not? 

It  is  as  superior  to  the  Christianity,  so  called, 
that  sets  aside  miracle  and  doctrine,  turns  its  back 
on  the  hereafter,  makes  its  appeal  in  behalf  of 
the  present  alone,  and  grounds  its  claim  to  au- 
thority, not  ona"  thus  saith  the  Lord, ' '  but  on  a 
"thus  saith  science  and  reason";  a  Christianity 
that  owns  the  law  of  evolution  as  its  present  force 
and  defining  motive ;  it  is  as  superior  to  that  sort 
of  Christianity  and  as  high  above  it  as  the  heavens 
are  above  the  earth. 

One  night  this  summer  I  stood  upon  a  moun- 
tain ridge  and  watched  the  revelation  of  the  starry 
sky.  The  great  constellations,  like  silver  squad- 
rons, were  sailing  slowly  and  majestically  to  their 
appointed  havens ;  from  north  to  south  and  from 
south  to  north  again,  the  Milky  Way  swept  up- 
ward from  its  double  horizon  to  the  zenith  like  a 
highway  paved  and  set  with  diamonds — a  highway 
over  which  the  wheels  of  the  king's  chariot  had 
sped,  leaving  behind  that  cloud  of  dust  in  which 
every  gleaming  particle  was  a  burnished  sun.    I 


86       Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

gazed  spellbound  until  it  was  as  the  vision  of  an 
unfathomed  sea,  an  ocean  tide  of  light,  where  the 
shimmering  foam  was  the  rise  and  fall  of  single 
and  multiple  systems,  the  surf  beat  breaking  on 
the  shores  of  converging  universes.  I  gazed  on 
this  wealth  and  congeries  of  far-flung  worlds,  in 
which  some  that  appeared  the  most  insignificant 
and  twinkled  and  trembled  as  though  each  glimmer 
would  be  the  last,  were  actually  so  great  that  be- 
side them  our  own  poor  little  world  was  but  as  a 
mole  hill  to  earth's  Himalayas;  as  I  gazed  I 
thought  of  the  distance  from  world  to  world — 
measured  as  light  travels — till  the  count  of  years 
fell  away,  and  there  were  no  more  numbers  with 
which  to  count,  and  I  knew  that  at  the  end  of  this 
calculation  I  had  but  entered  the  suburbs  of  that 
realm  for  which  we  have  but  one  word,  whose  in- 
adequacy we  all  confess — the  Infinite.  I  listened, 
the  silence  seemed  to  utter  forth  majesty  and 
might  and  honor  and  omnipotence,  the  air  had  in 
it  the  breath  of  sacred  and  adoring  things,  and 
unwittingly  I  cried  out,  alone  in  the  night  there, 
"The  heavens,  0  God,  declare  thy  glory  and  the 
firmament  showeth  thy  handiwork.' ' 

And  when  I  look  at  this  Christianity  set  forth  in 
the  New  Testament,  and  anticipated  in  the  Old, 
the  constellations  of  doctrine,  this  Via  Lactea  of 
truth  in  which  every  statement  is  a  sun  of  splen- 
dor; when  I  begin  to  get  the  sweep  of  the  divine 
purpose  coming  up  from  the  opening  pages  of 
Genesis  and  culminating  in  the  book  of  the  Eeve- 


Cheistianity  87 

lation ;  when  I  see  that  Christianity  is  the  presen- 
tation to  us  of  the  ways  and  means  whereby  the 
original  thought  of  incarnation  (and  this  was  the 
very  first  thought  stamped  upon  the  first  pages 
of  the  Genesis  record  of  the  creation  of  man;  for 
incarnation  is  conceived  in  Eden  before  it  is 
brought  to  the  birth  in  Bethlehem) — when  I  see 
this  original  thought  of  incarnation,  in  spite  of 
sin  and  failure,  and  the  world's  captivity  to  the 
Devil  and  his  angels ;  when  I  see  this  high  purpose 
of  God  at  last  realized,  and  realized  so  completely 
that  each  redeemed  soul  is  in  final  terms 
the  glorious  enthronement  of  God  in  humanity, 
and  that  God  in  Christ  and  in  the  Christian, 
gets  his  own  world  again,  I  cry  out  with  full 
tribute  of  heart  and  intellect:  "0  Lord,  this  is 
the  Christianity  which  thou  hast  wrought,  thy 
name  is  written  in  every  doctrine,  every  line  justi- 
fies, as  it  proclaims  thee,  the  infinite  and  gracious 
author. ' ' 

This  is  the  Christianity  to  preach. 

Let  the  preacher  preach  a  Christianity  of  doc- 
trine. 

There  are  three  important  things  every 
preacher  should  preach.  The  first  thing  is  doc- 
trine. The  second  thing  is  doctrine.  The  third 
and  pre-eminent  thing  is  doctrine.  The  church  is 
starving  to  death  for  the  want  of  it,  the  preachers 
are  becoming  emasculated  apologists  for  lack  of  it, 
and  the  world,  looking  on,  is  laughing  at  a  limp, 
genuflecting  thing  calling  itself  modern   Chris- 


88       Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

tianity  and  for  want  of  vertebrate  strength,  un- 
able to  stand  alone. 

It  was  doctrine  believed  in  and  preached  which 
sustained  the  martyrs  and  gave  courage  to  mis- 
sionaries. He  who  believed  in  the  sovereignty 
of  a  redeeming  God,  the  certainty  that  God  would 
get  his  elect,  the  Coming  of  Christ,  the  millennial 
triumph,  and  a  rebel  world  surrendered  at  the  feet 
of  God,  could  endure  the  agony  of  the  stake,  the 
privation  of  the  wilderness,  and  all  the  discom- 
forts and  all  the  discouragements  of  fields  of  en- 
deavor well  sowed  but  scantily  reaped. 

Let  the  preacher  preach  the  supernatural — the 
things  that  are  miraculous,  and  be  unafraid. 

He  need  not  be  afraid.  The  world  wants  that 
sort  of  preaching.  It  is  growing  tired  at  heart  of 
mere  machinery  and  this  eternally  running  up 
against  a  formula  of  the  laboratory  or  a  mathe- 
matical calculation  and  analyzed  force,  as  explana- 
tory of  everything  in  heaven  and  in  earth.  It 
would  like,  if  it  were  possible,  to  believe  in  some- 
thing a  little  beyond  the  length  of  its  eyelashes 
and  the  touch  of  its  finger  tips;  something  that 
cannot  be  summed  up  always  in  avoirdu- 
pois; something,  indeed,  beyond  the  ability  of 
man. 

Let  the  church  get  back  to  the  old-fashioned 
doctrinal,  supernatural,  miraculous  Christianity 
that  underwrites  itself  with  the  name  of  God.  Let 
it  be  boldly  proclaimed  that  Christianity  is 
miraculous,  because  it  is,  first  and  last,  the  Chris- 


Christianity  89 

tianity  of  that  God  who  is  himself — the  eternal 
miracle. 

The  very  salvation  of  the  church  as  a  church 
depends  upon  this  retrograde. 

If  the  church  hesitates,  compromises,  seeks  to  ac- 
commodate its  formulas  to  modern  nomenclature. 
If  it  is  willing  to  carry  its  baggage  at  half  weight ; 
if  it  is  willing  to  make  its  proclamation  a  continual 
denial  of  all  that  it  has  heretofore  professed  as 
fundamental ;  if  it  believes  the  twentieth  century 
has  the  call  on  the  first,  and  that  modernism  out- 
ranks primitivism ;  if,  in  short,  it  looks  upon  prim- 
itive and  apostolic  Christianity  as  the  feeble  hint 
which  the  modern  thinker  has  known  how  to 
modify  and  improve,  then,  as  already  sug- 
gested, the  days  of  its  spiritual  and  moral 
bankruptcy  are  in  sight,  and  the  sooner  good 
business  arrangements  are  made  to  hire  out  its 
meeting  houses  for  ethical  and  social  culture  the 
better. 

Let  the  church  persevere  in  turning  its  back 
upon  the  hereafter;  let  it  continue  the  folly  of 
ignoring  the  eschatological  emphasis  of  Chris- 
tianity ;  let  it  keep  on  giving  to  men  the  anodynes 
of  mere  moral  maxims ;  let  it  direct  all  its  energies 
to  improving  and  perfecting  a  society  which  God 
has  already  judged  and  condemned  at  its  best,  and 
presently  these  drugged  and  befooled  people  will 
awake,  the  drugs  will  no  longer  be  effective,  and 
they  will  turn  in  indignation  upon  a  Christianity 
which  began  by  professing  to  be  a  revelation  from 


90       Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

God  and  ends  by  confessing  to  be  nothing  more 
than  an  evolution  from  man. 

It  is  time  for  preachers  to  arouse  if  they  would 
have  the  hearing,  and  not  the  indifferent  ears. 

Let  them  refuse  to  apologize  or  defend. 

Let  them  have  the  courage  of  divine  conviction. 

Let  them  refuse  to  admit  into  their  fellowship 
men  who  are  willing  that  a  bar-sinister  shall  be 
stained  across  the  birth  hour  of  the  Christ;  who 
are  ready  to  smile  away  such  a  title  as  "the  Bles- 
sed Virgin";  who  can  read  no  deeper  meaning  in 
the  cross  than  a  brutal  murder,  and  who  do  not 
yet  know  that  in  the  garden  of  Arimathea  there  is 
still  an  empty  tomb.  Let  them  refuse  ministerial 
ordination  and  partnership  with  men  who,  bearing 
the  university  brand,  claim  the  authority  of  a  self- 
elected  scholarship  to  make  the  Word  of  God  sec- 
ondary to  the  word  of  man.  Let  them  go  forth 
and  proclaim  to  the  world  with  the  voice  of  assur- 
ance which  permits  of  no  debate  and  will  accept 
no  recall,  the  Christianity  that  is  summed  up,  is 
perfectly  defined  and  holds  inclusively  all  its  splen- 
dor of  doctrine  in  the  three  immense  facts  which 
its  Gospel  proclaims : 

The  abolition  of  death,  the  gift  of  a  new  and 
spiritual  life,  and  the  guaranty  to  every  believer 
of  a  resplendent  immortality  like  unto  his  who  sits 
on  yonder  throne — both  eternal  God  and  immortal 
man — Coming  Bridegroom  and  Triumphant  King. 

Let  them  preach  this.  Let  them  tell  the  guilty 
sinner  that  the  blood  of  Our  Lord  Jesus  Christ 


Chbistianity  91 

meets  his  case  and  can  make  the  foulest  clean ;  let 
them  tell  the  slave-bound  sinner  that  in  a  moment, 
in  the  flash  of  an  eye  glance,  a  risen  Saviour  can 
deliver  him  and  set  him  free;  let  them  tell  the 
dying  that  death  has  lost  its  sting,  and  at  death 
a  convoy  of  heaven's  host  shall  bear  him  away 
from  his  home  in  this  mortal  body  to  be  at  home 
in  heaven  with  his  ascended  Lord;  let  them  cry 
above  every  Christian  grave,  louder  than  the 
sound  of  any  falling  tear:  " Jesus  is  coming  to 
raise  your  dead  and  change  the  living  and  clothe 
each  saint  with  immortal  beauty";  let  them  look 
abroad  upon  a  world  full  of  the  storm  of  sin,  the 
tumult  of  high  passion  and  long  rebellion  against 
our  God,  and  shout  aloud  that  victory  cometh  in 
the  end;  that  Christ  is  God  as  well  as  man;  that 
the  days  of  his  glory  are  at  hand,  when  the  '  '  God 
of  the  whole  earth"  shall  he  be  called;  and  when  all 
beneath  a  perfect  heaven  in  a  perfect  world  shall 
know  him  as  Lord  and  God  from  the  least  to  the 
greatest.  Let  them  preach  this,  and  with  un- 
broken confidence  repeat  the  exultant  words  of 
Holy  Writ,  the  words  which  shall  warrant  all  their 
speech,  that ' '  our  Saviour  Jesus  Christ  hath  abol- 
ished death,  and  hath  brought  life  and  immor- 
tality to  light  through  the  Gospel";  and  it  will  be 
this  Gospel  echoing  forth  with  all  the  music  of 
its  joyful  tidings  that  shall  answer  infallibly  and 
beyond  all  dispute  the  question  of  the  hour — 
What  is  Christianity?" 


a 


Ube  Bible 

THE  WORD  OF  GOD 

"  When  ye  received  the  word  of  God  which  ye  heard  of  us,  ye 
received  it  not  as  the  word  of  man,  but  as  it  is  in  truth,  the 
word  of  God."  (1  Thessalonians  2:13.) 

^^^^JHE  Apostle  here  testifies  that  he  believes 
m  C*\  himself  to  be  the  bearer  of  a  revelation 
m  J  direct   from   God;   that  the   words   he 

^^i^^  speaks  and  the  words  he  writes  are  not 
the  words  of  man,  but  the  Word  of  God,  warm 
with  his  breath,  filled  with  his  thoughts,  and 
stamped  with  his  will. 

In  this  same  epistle  he  writes : 

"For  this  we  say  unto  you  by  the  word  of  the 
Lord."  (1  Thessalonians  4:15.) 

The  preposition  "by"  is  the  dative  of  investi- 
ture as  well  as  means,  and  is  Paul's  declaration 
that  what  he  is  writing  to  the  Thessalonians  are 
not  his  ideas,  clothed  in  his  own  language,  but 
ideas  and  thoughts  whose  investiture,  whose  very 
clothing,  is  no  less  than  the  word  of  the  ascended 
Lord — he  who  is  none  other  than  the  "Word  of 
God." 

Writing  to  the  Corinthians  he  says : 

"Which  things  we  speak,  not  in  the  ivords 
which  man's  wisdom  teacheth,  but  (and  grammar 

92 


The  Bible  93 

requires  us  to  understand)  in  the  words  which  the 
Holy  Ghost  teacheth."  (1  Corinthians  2:13.) 

According  to  Paul's  testimony,  therefore,  the 
fourteen  epistles  which  he  wrote  to  the  churches 
are  not  letters  written  by  a  mortal  man,  giving  ex- 
pression to  the  ideas  and  thoughts  of  man,  but  are 
the  very  words  of  the  infinite  God,  giving  utter- 
ance by  the  Holy  Ghost  to  the  thoughts  of  God. 

An  examination  of  the  other  epistles  of  the  New 
Testament  will  show  the  same  high  and  unqualified 
pretension.  The  apostles  write  (all  of  them)  not 
as  men  who  are  giving  an  opinion  of  their  own, 
but  as  men  who  know  themselves  under  the  dom- 
ination of  the  Spirit,  and  as  giving  authoritative 
expression  to  the  mind  and  will  of  God. 

Nor  is  this  peculiar  to  the  writers  of  the  New 
Testament. 

Constantly,  the  writers  of  the  Old  Testament 
introduce  their  message  with  the  tremendous  sen- 
tence :  i  l  Thus  saith  the  Lord. ' '  Again  and  again 
they  declare  the  Lord  has  spoken  "by"  them. 
David  says :  ' '  The  words  of  the  Lord  were  in  my 
tongue."  Jeremiah  says  the  Word  of  the  Lord 
came  to  him  and  the  Lord  said:  "Take  a  roll  of 
a  book  and  write  therein  all  the  words  that  I  have 
spoken  to  thee."  Then  we  are  told  that  "Jere- 
miah called  Baruch,  the  son  of  Neriah;  and 
Baruch  wrote  from  the  mouth  of  Jeremiah  all  the 
words  of  the  Lord,  which  he  had  spoken  unto  him, 
upon  a  roll  of  a  book." 

After  these  words  had  been  read  to  the  princes 


94       Cheist,  Cheistianity  and  the  Bible 

of  Israel,  they  asked  Baruch,  saying,  "Tell  us 
now,  how  didst  thou  write  all  these  words  at  his 
mouth  ? ' '  Then  Baruch  answered  them,  ' '  He  pro- 
nounced all  these  words  unto  me  with  his  mouth, 
and  I  wrote  them  with  ink  in  the  book." 

The  process  is  clear  enough.  The  Lord  spake 
his  words  in  Jeremiah.  Jeremiah  received  the 
words  direct  from  the  Lord,  dictated  them  word 
for  word  to  Baruch,  Baruch  wrote  them  as  they 
were  pronounced  in  a  book ;  and  when  written,  the 
words  were  the  written  words  of  God. 

Ezekiel  declares  when  the  Lord  commanded  him 
to  speak  to  the  children  of  Israel,  he  said  to  him : 
"Speak  with  my  words  unto  them."  Ezekiel  not 
only  speaks  them,  he  writes  them  in  the  book  of  his 
prophecy.  Ezekiel  gives  an  account  of  how  the 
Lord  spake  to  him  and  inspired  the  book  which 
bears  his  name.  He  says:  "The  Spirit  entered 
into  me  when  he  spoke  to  me;  .  .  .  the  spirit 
entered  into  me  and  spake  with  me."  The  Spirit 
said  unto  him:  "When  I  speak  with  thee,  I  will 
open  thy  mouth,  and  thou  shalt  say  unto  them, 
thus  saith  the  Lord." 

The  Apostle  Paul,  speaking  in  commendation 
of  Timothy  because  from  a  child  he  had  known  the 
Holy  Scriptures  (and  by  Holy  Scriptures  the 
Apostle  meant  the  Old  Testament  from  Genesis  to 
Malachi — these  were  the  Scriptures  Timothy  as 
well  as  every  Jew  knew  as  such),  tells  him  that 
all  Scripture  (and  of  course  any  decent  exegesis 
of  the  passage  with  its  weight  of  context  would 


The  Bible  95 

Recognize  that  the  Apostle  was  referring  to  the 
Scriptures  Timothy  had  known  from  childhood, 
the  Scriptures  as  we  have  them  to-day  from  Gen- 
esis to  Malachi) — Paul  tells  Timothy  in  the  most 
precise  terms  that  all  these  writings  are  inspired 
of  God. 

The  Apostle  Peter,  corroboratively  speaking  of 
these  very  Scriptures  of  the  Old  Testament,  says 
they  came  not  "by  the  will  of  man,  but  holy  men 
of  old  spake  as  they  were  moved  (literally,  carried 
along)  by  the  Holy  Ghost.' ' 

Thus,  this  book  we  call  the  Bible  comes  to  us 
with  the  enormous  and  uncompromising  claim 
that  it  is  not  a  man-made  book,  but  a  book  whose 
real  and  sole  author  is  the  living  and  eternal 
God. 

This  claim  stands  face  to  face  with  human  need. 

Here  we  are  from  birth  to  death,  pilgrims  on 
the  highway  of  time,  not  knowing  whence  we 
come,  nor  whither  we  go.  We  need  a  guide  to 
lead  us,  a  light  to  shine  when  we  stand  at  that  part- 
ing of  the  ways — where  eternity  becomes  the  end 
of  time. 

This  book  meets  us  and  claims  to  be  all  that — a 
guide  through  time,  a  light  to  shine  upon  the  road 
that  leads  to  God  and  to  be,  in  every  line  and 
accent,  the  inspired,  incorruptible,  infallible  "Word 
of  God. 

How  may  we  know  it  is  all  it  claims  to  be? 

Never  more  than  now  did  we  need  to  know  it. 

Voices  in  the  air  are  crying  that  we  have  been 


96       Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

deceived;  that  this  book  upon  which  our  fathers 
pillowed  their  heads  when  at  the  end  of  life's  jour- 
ney, they  laid  them  down  to  die ;  this  book  we  have 
held  as  a  lamp  to  our  feet  and  a  light  to  our  path 
is,  after  all,  at  its  best,  only  the  word  of  man  and 
not  the  Word  of  God  at  all. 

Every  now  and  then  resounding  blows  are  heard 
as  they  strike  against  the  old  foundation.  Those 
who  pretend  to  be  working  in  the  interest  of  the 
truth  bid  us  stand  aside,  lest  we  and  our  hopes  be 
buried  in  the  impending  ruin. 

We  need  to  know  at  any  cost  whether  this  splen- 
did and  sustaining  faith  has  deceived  us ;  whether 
this  book  we  have  looked  upon  as  holy  and  divine 
is  nothing  more  than  the  word  of  man,  spoken 
with  his  stammering  tongue  and  written  with  his 
stumbling  pen. 

We  must  know,  and  know  for  a  certainty  that 
will  leave  no  peradventure  to  arise  as  a  troubling 
after-ghost,  whether  this  Bible  is,  as  Paul  says  it 
is,  in  truth,  the  Word  of  God;  and  the  question 
will  insistently  repeat  itself: 

"How  may  we  know  the  Bible  is  the  Word  of 
God?" 

The  question  need  not  make  us  tremble. 

The  answers  are  at  hand. 

The  evidence  is  so  great,  its  very  wealth  is  an 
embarrassment. 

That  evidence  stated,  detailed,  analyzed  and 
elaborated,  would  require — not  a  few  pages — but 
whole  libraries. 


The  Bible  97 

One  broad  and  general  proposition  may  be  laid 
down. 

It  is  this : 

The  Bible  is  proved  to  BE  the  Word  of  God  when  it 
is  shown  to  be  NOT  the  word  of  man;  and  it  is  proved 
to  be  not  the  word  of  man  when  it  is  shown  to  be — 
not  such  a  book  as  a  man  WOULD  write  if  he 
COULD ;  nor  such  a  book  as  a  man  COULD  write  if 
he  WOULD. 

That  it  is  not  the  word  of  man — not  such  a  book 
as  a  man  would  write  if  he  could,  is  made  clear 
enough  by  the  picture  it  paints  of  the  natural  man. 

This  picture  is  so  sharply  drawn,  the  figures 
stand  out  in  such  living  and  apt  delineation,  that 
no  one  can  mistake  the  import. 

According  to  the  Bible,  man  came  direct  from 
the  hand  of  God.  God  created  him  body,  soul  and 
spirit — a  tripartite  being.  The  soul  was  the  per- 
son, the  seat  of  appetite  and  passions.  The  spirit 
was  the  seat  of  the  mind,  the  centre  of  reflection. 
Spirit  and  body  were  the  distinct  agents  of  the 
soul.  The  spirit,  the  agent  to  connect  the  soul 
with  God — the  body,  the  medium  of  the  soul's 
manifestation  or  materialization  in  this  world,  and 
the  instrument  for  its  use  and  enjoyment.  The 
mind,  seated  in  the  spirit,  was  intended,  under  the 
influence  of  the  spirit,  to  be  the  governor  and  reg- 
ulator of  the  soul — enabling  the  soul  rightly  to 
use  its  appetite  and  legitimately  to  satisfy  its 
passions. 

Thus  organized,  God  set  man  up  in  the  world 


98       Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

to  be  his  constitutional,  moral,  spiritual  and  gov- 
ernmental image — his  likeness  morally — his  image 
(his  representative)  administratively. 

Man  turned  his  back  on  God,  listened  to  the 
appetite  of  his  soul,  and  surrendered  to  the  de- 
mands of  sensual  hunger. 

The  soul,  at  once,  sank  down  into  the  environ- 
ment of  the  body.  The  mind  sank  down  into  the 
environment  of  the  soul  and  became,  henceforth, 
not  a  spiritual  mind,  but  a  mind  "sensual," 
"devilish,"  a  mind  continually  suggesting  to  the 
soul  fresh  and  unlimited  gratification  of  its  de- 
sires. With  the  breakdown  of  soul  and  mind,  the 
spirit  lost  its  vital  relationship  to  God,  lost  its 
function  as  a  connecting  link  with,  and  a  trans- 
mitter of,  the  mind  and  will  of  God;  so  that  it 
could  no  longer  enable  man  to  know  and  under- 
stand God ;  and  feeling  the  influence  of  the  mind, 
instead  of  influencing  it,  followed  it  in  its  down- 
ward course  into  the  environment  of  the  soul. 

Out  of  this  dislocation  the  soul  came  forth  dom- 
inant over  mind  and  spirit.  Soul  appetite  and 
soul  desires  became  supreme ;  the  body,  the  willing 
and  active  agent  thereof.  From  this  period  on, 
man  was  no  longer  a  possible  spiritual  being,  but 
a  "natural"  man.  The  word  "natural"  is  "soul- 
ical."  In  Scripture  it  is  twice  translated  "sen- 
sual." The  much-used  word  "psychological"  is 
a  derivation  of  it.  In  the  Bible  sense  of  the  word, 
a  psychological  person  is  just  the  opposite  of  a 
pneumatical  or  spiritual  person. 


The  Bible  99 

Man  was  now  psychological,  soulical,  sensual. 
He  had  been  transformed  into  a  being  no  better 
than  an  intellectual  animal,  and  the  slave  of  his 
physical  functions.  Instead  of  being  the  master 
of  his  appetites,  he  was  mastered  by  them.  His 
passions  intended,  under  right  use,  to  be  blessings, 
became  curses ;  instead  of  angels,  they  became  as 
demons.  Instead  of  dwelling  in  the  midst  of  his 
endowment  in  harmony  with  it  and  able  to  direct 
it,  he  found  himself  at  its  mercy,  incessantly  smit- 
ten by  it  and  suffering  his  own  equipment.  Ke- 
pudiating  faith,  walking  by  sight,  talking  of 
reason  and  governed  by  his  senses,  he  threw  him- 
self open  to  invasion  by  the  world,  the  flesh  and 
the  Devil. 

As  a  result  of  his  fall,  man  has  become  a  de- 
generate, full  of  the  germs  of  evil,  "  every 
imagination  of  the  thoughts  of  the  heart  only  evil 
continually' ' — an  incurable  self -corrupter. 

In  him  there  is  not  one  thing  that  commends 
him  to  a  holy  God;  and  even  should  he  succeed 
in  living  a  life  of  perfect  morality,  his  best 
righteousness  in  the  sight  of  God  would  be 
no  better  than  a  bundle  of  filthy  and  contagious 
rags. 

There  is  no  power  within  him  by  which  he  can 
change  the  essential  character  and  determined 
trend  of  his  life.  Men  do  not  gather  grapes  of 
thorns,  nor  figs  of  thistles.  All  the  effort  that  the 
most  devoted  and  laborious  of  men  might  give 
to  the  culture  of  a  hedgerow  of  thorns  would  not 


100      Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

succeed  in  producing  one  grape.  Though  men 
spent  life  and  fortune  in  cultivating  a  field  of 
thistles,  they  would  not  gather  a  single  fig.  No 
sooner  (says  the  Bible)  can  the  natural  man  bring 
forth  the  fruit  of  righteousness  unto  God.  The 
Ethiopian  may  change  his  skin,  the  leopard  his 
spots,  before  a  natural  man  can  change  himself 
into  a  spiritual  man.  ' '  The  carnal  mind  is  enmity 
with  God;  for  it  is  not  subject  to  the  law  of  God, 
neither  indeed  can  be."  "The  natural  man  (the 
word  ' natural'  is  ipvxucte,  soulical)  receiveth  not 
the  things  of  the  Spirit  of  God :  for  they  are  fool- 
ishness unto  him:  neither  can  he  know  them,  be- 
cause they  are  spiritually  (nvevtiTLtiQg^  pneumati- 
cally) discerned.' '  "The  heart  is  deceitful  above 
all  things,  and  desperately  wicked :  who  can  know 
it?"  meaning  thereby  that  God  alone  can  sound 
the  depths  of  its  measureless  capacity  for  sin  and 
iniquity;  therefore,  he  says:  "I  the  Lord  search 
the  heart,  I  try  the  reins. ' ' 

The  end  of  man  is  to  die. 

Such  an  end  is  not  natural. 

It  is  unnatural. 

It  is  violent. 

It  is  penal. 

It  is  an  appointed  punishment :  as  it  is  written : 
"It  is  appointed  unto  men  once  to  die."  "By 
one  man  sin  entered  into  the  world,  and  death 
by  sin;  and  so  death  passed  (literally,  passed 
through,  pierced  man ;  the  seeds  of  death  entered 
him  for  himself  and  all  his  posterity).    When  he 


The  Bible  101 

dies,  therefore,  be  he  never  so  moral  and  upright, 
his  death  is  judicial,  his  taking  off  is  the  execution 
of  a  criminal. 

He  is  to  be  raised  from  the  dead  as  to  his  body 
(in  the  meantime,  his  soul  is  " dragged' '  down- 
ward to  the  prison  of  the  underworld,  where  in 
conscious  suffering  he  awaits  the  second  resurrec- 
tion and  the  judgment  hour),  he  will  be  raised, 
judged,  found  guilty  and  cast  forth  into  the  lake 
of  fire  (which  is  the  second  death),  from  whence 
there  will  be  no  resurrection  of  the  body  (the  body 
will  perish  in  the  fire — for  an  immortal  body  be- 
longs only  to  the  sons  of  God — the  participants  in 
the  First  Eesurrection) ;  then,  as  a  disembodied 
spirit — a  ghost — he  will  go  forth  with  an  inward, 
deathless  worm,  and  an  inward,  quenchless  fire, 
to  be  like  "a  wandering  star  unto  whom  is  re- 
served the  blackness  of  darkness  forever,' '  an 
exile  from  God,  outside  the  orbit  of  divine  grace, 
love  and  life — a  hopeless,  an  eternally  hopeless — 
human  derelict,  upon  the  measureless  sea  of  night 
and  space. 

That  is  the  Bible  picture  of  the  natural  man. 

Is  that  the  picture  the  natural  man  paints  of 
himself? 

I  trow  not ! 

Man  looks  upon  himself  as  a  son  of  God  by 
nature,  having  in  himself  all  the  elements  of  di- 
vinity, and  all  the  forces  necessary  to  shape  his 
life  aright.  He  is  proud  of  himself,  and  talks  of 
the  dignity  of  human  nature.    He  describes  him- 


102     Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

self  in  panegyric,  magnifies  his  virtue  and  mini- 
mizes his  vice. 

He  flatters  himself  in  his  own  eyes. 

The  two  concepts — that  of  the  Bible  and  that 
of  the  natural  man — are  as  far  apart  from  each 
other  as  the  heavens  are  from  the  earth. 

To  man,  the  Bible  concept  is  false,  belittling, 
wholly  disastrous  and  degrading,  the  death  knell 
to  any  possible  inspiration  for  human  effort  and 
attainment.  It  is  a  concept  against  which  he  re- 
volts with  all  the  nature  in  him,  and  hates  with 
an  exceeding  great  hatred. 

In  the  very  nature  of  the  case,  then,  the  Bible 
concept  of  man  is  not  due  to  man ;  it  is  not  such  a 
concept  that  he  tvould  write  if  he  could. 

The  picture  which  the  Bible  paints  of  sin  is  not  such 
a  picture  as  the  natural  man  has  ever  painted. 

The  Bible  declares  that  sin  is  something  more 
than  fever  or  disease  or  weakness,  it  is  high 
treason  against  Jehovah,  it  is  a  blow  at  his  in- 
tegrity, a  rebellion  against  his  government,  a 
discord  to  his  being  and  a  movement  whose  final 
tendency  would  be  to  dislodge  him  from  his 
throne. 

The  Bible  hates  sin  and  has  no  mercy  for  it. 

The  very  leaves  of  the  book  seem  to  curl  and 
grow  crisp  under  the  fire  of  its  hatred.  So  fearful 
is  its  denunciation  that  the  sinner  shivers  and 
hastens  to  turn  away  from  a  book  whose  lightest 
denunciation  of  sin  has  in  it  the  menace  of  eternal 
judgment.    Like  a  great  fiery  eye  it  looks  into  the 


The  Bible  103 

very  recesses  of  the  heart  and  reveals  its  intents 
and  purposes.  It  sees  lust  hiding  there  in  all  its 
lecherous  deformity  and  says,  he  who  exercises 
it  solely  in  his  mind  is  as  guilty  in  God's  sight  as 
though  he  had  committed  the  act.  It  looks  into 
the  heart  and  sees  hate  crouching  there  with  its 
tiger-like  fangs  and  readiness  to  spring,  and  says 
that  he  who  hates  his  brother  is  already  a  mur- 
derer. 

The  Bible  has  no  forgiveness  for  sin  until  it 
has  been  fully  and  fearfully  punished.  In  this  it 
simply  echoes  the  law  stamped  and  steeped  in 
nature.  Nature  never  forgives  its  violated  law 
until  it  has  punished  it.  The  Bible  demands  satis- 
faction, complete  and  absolute,  before  it  offers 
even  the  hint  of  forgiveness.  It  takes  the  guilty 
sinner  to  the  cross  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ  and 
shows  him  God's  hatred  of  sin  to  be  so  great,  that 
the  moment  his  holy  and  spotless  Son  representa- 
tively takes  the  sinner's  place,  he  smites  him  and 
pours  out  upon  him  a  tidal  sweep  of  wrath  in  a 
terror  of  relentless  judgment  and  indignation  so 
immense,  that  the  earth  quivers  like  an  aspen, 
rocks  to  and  fro,  reels  in  its  orbit  till  the  sun  of 
day  refuses  to  shine,  and  the  moon  of  night  hangs 
in  the  startled  heavens  like  a  great  clot  of  human 
blood. 

The  Bible  declares  that  forgiveness  of  sin  can 
come  to  the  sinner  only  by  way  of  the  anguish  and 
punishment  of  the  cross;  and  that  no  sinner  can 
be  forgiven  till  he  has  accepted  the  downpour  of 


104     Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

the  wrath  of  God  on  the  cross  and  the  substitu- 
tional agony  of  the  Son  of  God  as  the  punishment 
he  himself  so  justly  deserves. 

The  Bible  teaches  that  in  the  awful  cry,  "My 
God,  my  God,  why  hast  thou  forsaken  me?"  the 
sinner  should  hear  the  echo  of  his  own  agony,  as 
of  one  forsaken  of  God  and  swept  out  of  his  pres- 
ence forever;  and  that  the  only  ground  of  ap- 
proach to  this  righteous  God  is  the  atoning  blood 
of  his  crucified  Son ;  that  he  who  would  approach 
God,  find  forgiveness  and  justification,  must  claim 
that  crucified  Son  of  God  as  his  sin-offering,  his 
vicarious  sacrifice,  his  personal  substitute.  By 
the  hell  of  the  cross  alone  can  he  find  the  heaven 
of  forgiveness  and  peace. 

Is  this  man's  attitude  to,  and  definition  of,  for- 
giveness and  peace? 

It  is  not. 

Man  does  not  hate  sin.  He  loves  it.  He  rolls  it 
as  a  sweet  morsel  under  his  tongue.  He  condones 
it  in  its  worst  form.  To  him  it  is  genital  weak- 
ness or  an  overplus  of  animal  life — an  exuberance 
of  the  spirit.  It  is  a  racial  inheritance  and  not  an 
individual  fault.  It  is  temperamental  and  not 
criminal. 

The  Bible  concept  and  the  natural  concept  of 
sin  contradict  each  other;  both,  therefore,  cannot 
have  the  same  author. 

The  Bible  concept  of  holiness  is  not  the  concept  of 
the  natural  man. 

In  the  Bible,  holiness  is  not  goodness  and  kind- 


The  Bible  105 

ness,  nor  even  morality.  Holiness  as  the  Bible 
sets  it  before  us  is  the  correspondence  of  the  soul 
with  God,  the  soul  reflecting  the  intent,  desire 
and  innermost  character  of  God;  so  that,  were 
God  to  enter  into  the  soul,  he  should  find  him- 
self as  much  at  home  as  upon  his  own  exalted 
throne. 

Such  a  definition  as  that  makes  human  perfec- 
tion and  all  its  claims  to  holiness  seem  no  better 
than  a  painted  wanton  dressed  in  the  garb  of 
purity  and  mouthing  the  words  of  virtue  and 
chastity. 

Whence  comes  this  wisdom  of  holiness  which 
makes  the  loftiest  ideal  of  man  no  higher  than  the 
dust  of  the  roadway,  his  best  righteousness  criti- 
cizable  goodness  and  altogether  a  negligible  quan- 
tity? 

If  it  is  from  man,  it  must  arise  from  two  sources 
— human  experience  or  human  imagination. 

It  cannot  come  from  human  experience !  no  nat- 
ural man  in  the  past  has  experienced  it — none  to- 
day experience  it. 

It  cannot  come  from  imagination;  for  a  man 
cannot  imagine  what  he  has  not  seen,  known  or 
experienced.  As  he  has  not  experienced  holiness 
he  cannot  imagine  it. 

In  the  nature  of  the  case — the  Bible  concept  of 
holiness  did  not  originate  with  man,  and  that  much 
of  the  Bible,  evidently,  is  not  of  man. 

That  the  Bible  is  not  the  word  of  man  is  shown  by 
its  statements  of  accurate  science,  written  before  men 


106     Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

became  scientific,  and  while  as  yet  natural  science  did 
not  exist. 

The  record  of  creation  is  given  in  the  opening 
verses  of  Genesis. 

Whence  came  the  wisdom  which  enabled  the 
writer  in  a  pre-scientific  age  to  set  forth  a  cos- 
mogony in  snch  a  fashion  that  it  does  not  con- 
tradict the  latest  findings  of  the  geologist? 

The  Bible  says  the  earth  was  without  form  and 
void. 

Science  says  the  same  thing.  Over  a  hot  gran- 
ite crust,  an  ocean  of  fire,  and  beyond  that  an  im- 
penetrable atmosphere  loaded  with  carbonic  acid 
gas. 

Cuvier,  the  founder  of  paleontology,  says  in  his 
discourse  on  the  revolutions  of  the  globe,  "Moses 
has  left  us  a  cosmogony,  the  exactitude  of  which 
is  most  wonderfully  confirmed  every  day." 

Quensted  says,  "Moses  was  a  great  geologist, 
wherever  he  may  have  obtained  his  knowledge.,, 
Again  he  says,  ' '  The  venerable  Moses,  who  makes 
the  plants  appear  first,  has  not  yet  been  proven  at 
fault;  for  there  are  marine  plants  in  the  very 
lowest  deposit." 

Dana,  of  Yale  College,  has  said  that  the  record 
of  creation  given  by  Moses  and  that  written  in 
the  rocks  are  the  same  in  all  general  features. 

Whence  came  the  wisdom  which  kept  Moses 
from  hopelessly  blundering? 

Moses  places  the  account  of  the  original  crea- 
tion in  the  first  verse.    In  the  second,  he  states 


The  Bible  107 

the  earth  fell  into  chaos.  "It  became  (not  was) 
without  form,  and  void." 

Isaiah,  the  prophet,  declares  definitely  that  God 
did  not  create  the  earth  without  form  and  void — 
God  never  was  the  author  of  chaos — he  made  the 
earth  habitable  from  the  beginning. 

The  first  verse  of  Genesis  records  the  creation 
of  this  original  and  habitable  earth.  The  second 
verse  shows,  as  the  result  of  some  mighty  cata- 
clysm, that  the  original  earth  fell  into  a  state  of 
chaos.  The  second  verse,  and  the  verses  follow- 
ing, are  the  record  of  the  making  over  of  the  earth 
after  it  had  fallen  into  a  state  of  chaos. 

Whence  the  wisdom  which  taught  Moses  what 
science  in  our  day  is  only  beginning  to  spell  out, 
that  the  present  earth  is  not  an  original  creation, 
but  a  remaking;  that  the  original  creation  goes 
back  beyond  the  time  of  shifted  crust,  of  tilted 
rock,  of  ice  and  fire  and  mist  and  formless  chaos? 

Whence  came  the  wisdom  and  knowledge  which 
led  Job  to  say  that  it  is  impossible  to  count  the 
stars  for  number,  when  it  was  possible  in  his  day, 
and  is  equally  possible  in  our  day,  to  count  them 
with  the  naked  eye? 

How  did  he  know,  what  the  telescope  alone  re- 
veals, that  the  number  of  the  stars  as  flashed  forth 
in  the  field  of  these  telescopes  is  utterly  beyond 
our  computation ;  and  that  in  the  attempt  to  num- 
ber them,  figures  break,  fall  into  dust,  and  are 
swept  away  as  the  chaff  of  the  summer's  thresh- 
ing floor? 


108     Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

How  did  he,  looking  up  with  that  naked  eye  of 
his,  how  did  he  know  that  in  the  Milky  Way  there 
are  countless  thousands  of  suns — and  these  the 
centres  of  other  systems?  How  did  he  know  that 
world-on-world  ranges  in  the  upper  spaces  of  the 
silent  sky,  so  multitudinously  that  each  increase  of 
the  power  of  the  telescope  only  adds  unaccountable 
myriads  until,  looking  from  the  rim  of  those 
nightly  searchers,  the  eye  beholds  reach  on  reach 
of  luminous  clouds,  and  learns  with  awe  profound, 
that  these  clouds  are  stars,  are  suns  and  systems — 
but  so  far  away  from  us  and  from  one  another 
that  they  cannot  be  separated  and  distinguished 
by  the  most  powerful  glasses;  and  that  these 
clouds,  if  we  really  could  separate  them  and  bring 
them  within  the  field  of  our  particular  vision, 
would  reveal  themselves  as  suns  and  systems  so 
numerous,  that  only  the  Creator  himself  could 
number  them? 

How  did  Job  know  all  this  in  that  far  day  when 
he  sat  at  his  tent  door  in  the  beauty  of  the  cloud- 
less sky  and  without  a  telescope?  How  did  he 
know  all  this  so  that  he  could  tell  us  with  absolute 
certainty  what  we  now  know  only  by  the  aid  of 
modern  science — that  the  stars  cannot  be  counted 
for  number? 

How  did  he  know  what  only  the  modern  tele- 
scope reveals,  that  the  North  is  stretched  out  over 
the  empty  place  ?  How  did  he  know  that  there  in 
the  Northern  sky  there  is  a  space  where  no  star 
does  shine — a  dark  abyss  of  fathomless  night — as 


The  Bible  109 

if,  suddenly,  the  universe  of  worlds  had  come  to 
an  end? 

How  did  he  know,  at  the  moment  when  the  wise 
men  of  his  day  were  saying  that  the  earth  was 
supported  on  the  shoulders  of  a  giant,  that  the 
giant  stood  on  a  platform  made  of  the  backs  of 
elephants;  that  the  elephants  stood  on  the  back 
of  a  mighty  tortoise,  but  where  the  tortoise  stood 
none  of  them  said;  how  did  he  dare  at  that  time 
to  write  that  God  hangeth  the  earth  on  nothing? 

How  did  Isaiah  know  that  the  world  is  round? 
How  did  he  learn  to  speak  of  "the  circle  of  the 
earth,' '  at  the  time  when  the  scientific  men  of  his 
day  said  that  it  was  four  square  and  flat? 

How  did  he  know  of  that  imponderable  ether  in 
which  the  stellar  universe  is  said  to  float?  Who 
taught  him  to  say  that  God  spread  out  the  heavens 
as  "thinness,"  when  the  wise  men  of  that  hour 
were  teaching  they  were  a  solid  vault?  How  is  it 
that  he  made  use  of  the  most  scientific  term  when 
he  speaks  of  the  heavens  as  "thinness"?  It  is 
true  in  our  English  version  he  is  made  to  say  that 
God  spread  out  the  heavens  as  a  "tent";  but  the 
word  "tent"  in  the  Hebrew  is  pi  (doq)  and  its  root 
meaning  signifies  a  thing  that  has  been  beaten 
out  or  stretched  into  thinness — an  elastic  thinness ; 
it  is  a  word  accurately  describing  the  ether  which 
scientific  men  tell  us  is  so  thin  that  a  teacup  full 
of  it  may  be  blown  out  into  a  transparent  bubble 
as  large  as  the  earth,  and,  even  then,  its  attenua- 
tion would  seem  no  greater  than  at  the  beginning. 


110     Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

How  did  Isaiah  know  all  this? 

Evidently  his  knowledge  and  wisdom  did  not 
come  from  the  knowledge  and  wisdom  of  his  day. 

That  the  Bible  did  not  come  from  man  is  seen  in  the 
fact  of  fulfilled  prohpecy. 

Page  after  page  of  this  book  is  filled  with 
prophetic  announcements. 

History  and  human  experience  record  their 
amazing  fulfilment. 

The  prophet  Daniel  gives  the  history  of  four 
great  world  empires,  Babylon,  Medo-Persia, 
Greece  and  Borne. 

The  rise  and  fall  of  these  empires  are  foretold 
centuries  ahead. 

The  total  ruin  and  perpetual  desolation  of 
Babylon  were  announced  when  the  city  shone  forth 
in  the  zenith  of  its  splendor. 

Daniel  writes  an  account  of  Alexander  the  Great 
two  hundred  and  fifty  years  before  he  is  born, 
calls  him  the  first  king  of  Greece,  describes  his 
march  for  the  conquest  of  the  East,  the  battle  of 
the  Grannicus,  his  sudden  death  at  Babylon,  and 
the  division  of  the  empire  among  his  four  gen- 
erals. 

At  the  hour  when  Rome  was  practically  passing 
through  her  travail  pains  of  national  birth,  Daniel 
foretold  its  ascension  to  power,  and  described  it 
as  a  wild  beast,  trampling  down  the  nations,  ab- 
sorbing into  itself  the  three  kingdoms  which  pre- 
ceded it,  occupying  the  territory  once  possessed 
by  them,  and  becoming  the  supreme  governmental 


The  Bible  111 

power  of  the  earth.  Centuries  before  it  took  place 
he  foretold  the  division  of  the  Koman  Empire  into 
two  equal  parts.  He  announced,  also,  that  it 
should  be  the  last  universal  political  power  till 
Christ  the  Lord  should  come  to  set  up  his  world- 
wide kingdom.  Centuries  have  passed  since  Rome 
ruled  the  world.  From  that  day  to  this  it  has 
remained  the  last  supreme  world-power.  The 
territory  once  ruled  by  it  is  filled  with  mighty 
nations — not  one  of  them,  great  as  it  may  be,  is  a 
universal  world-power. 

Where  did  Daniel  get  the  foresight  which  en- 
abled him  to  look  on  down  through  two  thousand 
years  of  human  history  and,  in  the  face  of  battle, 
intrigue  and  change,  declare,  what  so  far  has  come 
to  pass,  that  Rome  should  be  the  last  universal 
empire  till  Christ  came? 

Ezekiel,  the  prophet,  said  that  the  great  and 
populous  city  of  Tyre  should  be  taken,  cast  down, 
and  never  rebuilt ;  and  that  the  Lord  would  make 
it  to  be  like  the  top  of  a  scraped  rock  to  spread 
nets  upon. 

The  city  was  taken  and  destroyed.  The 
people  moved  to  an  island  just  off  the  mainland 
and  there  built  a  new  city.  Two  hundred  and 
fifty  years  after  Ezekiel  made  his  prophecy,  Alex- 
ander came,  besieged  the  new  city;  and,  in  order 
to  take  it,  built  a  causeway  from  the  mainland. 
In  doing  this  he  tore  down  and  utterly  demolished 
the  ruins  of  the  old  city;  took  its  stones  and  timber 
and  cast  them  into  the  sea;  and  then,  actually, 


112     Chkist,  Chkistianity  and  the  Bible 

set  his  soldiers  to  work  to  scrape  the  very  dust 
that  he  might  empty  it  into  the  waters.  From 
the  hour  when  it  was  overthrown  to  this,  the  city 
has  never  been  rebuilt;  and  for  centuries  it  has 
been,  and  is  to-day,  like  the  top  of  a  scraped  rock 
— a  place  where  fishermen  spread  their  nets. 

Where  did  Ezekiel  get  this  knowledge? 

Certainly  not  from  man. 

It  will  not  do  to  say  he  guessed  it ! 

Egypt  was  a  land  of  cities  and  temples.  The 
cities  were  populous,  the  temples  and  monuments 
colossal.  Avenues  of  gigantic  sphynx  led  to  gate- 
ways whose  immense  thresholds  opened  into  pil- 
lared halls,  where  the  carved  columns  seemed  like 
a  forest  of  stone.  Pyramids  rose  as  mountains, 
and  their  alabaster-covered  sides  flashed  back  the 
splendor  of  the  cloudless  skies.  The  land  bloomed 
as  a  garden.  The  papyrus  grew  by  the  banks  of 
the  Nile.  The  fisheries  of  the  mighty  river  filled 
the  treasury  of  kings  with  a  ceaseless  income. 
Art,  literature,  knowledge  and  culture  were  en- 
throned supreme — yet  was  it  a  land  of  false  gods 
and  a  people  given  over  to  their  worship. 

Speaking  in  the  name  of  God  the  prophet  an- 
nounced the  coming  desolation  of  Egypt.  It 
should  be  cast  down.  Its  fisheries  should  be  de- 
stroyed, its  papyrus  withered,  its  cities  and 
temples  overthrown  and  the  ruins  scattered  over 
the  plain,  no  native  prince  should  ever  again  sit 
upon  its  throne,  it  should  become  the  basest  of 
kingdoms. 


The  Bible  113 

It  has  become  such. 

Its  cities  are  destroyed.  Its  temples  are  roof- 
less, its  columns  fallen,  the  statues  of  its  kings 
lie  face  downward  in  the  dust,  the  pyramids, 
stripped  and  bare,  stand  scarred  and  silent  in  the 
sun.  The  singing  Memnon  are  as  songless  from 
their  chiselled  lips  as  the  tongueless  Sphynx  half 
buried  in  the  yellow  sand.  The  fisheries  are  gone, 
the  papyrus  has  withered ;  for  centuries  no  native 
prince  has  been  seated  on  the  throne.  It  is  a  land 
of  the  dead.  The  dead  are  everywhere.  At  every 
step  you  stumble  over  a  mummy,  the  mummy  of  a 
dead  cat,  a  dead  dog,  or  a  dead  and  shrivelled 
Pharaoh.  Its  greatest  asset  is  its  departed  glory, 
and  every  grain  of  sand  blown  from  the  mighty 
desert,  and  every  wave  of  reflected  light  flung  back 
from  the  Lybian  hills,  proclaims  the  terrific  ful- 
filment of  the  prophet's  words. 

The  prophets  foretold  the  final  siege  and  de- 
struction of  Jerusalem.  It  should  be  trodden  down 
of  the  Gentiles.  The  people  should  be  carried 
away  captive  and  sold  into  all  lands.  They  should 
be  scattered  from  one  end  of  the  earth  to  the  other. 
All  nations  should  despise  them.  They  should  be- 
come a  by-word,  a  hissing  and  a  scorn.  They 
should  be  hunted,  hounded  and  persecuted.  Their 
sufferings  should  be  unparalleled,  horrible,  un- 
speakable. The  sound  of  a  shaken  leaf  should 
startle  them.  They  were  to  become  the  people  of 
the  trembling  heart  and  the  wandering  foot. 

The  prophecies  have  been  singularly  fulfilled. 


114     Chkist,  Cheistianity  and  the  Bible 

Jerusalem  was  besieged  by  the  Bomans.  The  city 
was  taken.  The  city  and  temple  were  destroyed. 
Hundreds  of  thousands  perished  by  famine,  by 
fever,  by  fire  and  by  sword.  Titus,  the  Eoman 
conqueror,  drove  a  ploughshare  over  its  smoking 
ruins.  The  people  who  remained  alive  after  the 
general  slaughter  were  carried  away  captive. 
They  were  scattered  from  one  end  of  the  earth  to 
the  other.  They  have  found  their  dwelling  place 
among  all  nations.  They  dwell  everywhere  and 
are  at  home  nowhere.  They  have  been  a  by-word, 
a  hissing  and  a  scorn.  Every  hand  has  been 
turned  against  them.  They  have  been  hunted  on 
the  mountains.  They  have  been  chased  through 
the  valleys.  They  have  been  walled  up  in  the  nar- 
row and  filthy  ghettos  of  cities.  Their  goods  have 
been  stolen.  Their  wives  and  daughters  have  been 
ravished.  They  have  been  whipped  and  racked 
and  tortured.  They  have  been  broken  on  the 
wheel,  burned  at  the  stake,  buried  alive,  and  sent 
to  sea,  thousands  of  them,  in  sinking  ships.  Every 
cruelty  that  the  ingenuity  of  man  and  the  inspira- 
tion of  fiends  could  suggest  has  been  practised 
upon  them,  until  the  heart  revolts  and  the  soul 
sickens  at  the  mere  recital  of  their  blood  and  woe ; 
and  to  this  hour,  through  twenty  long  centuries, 
Jerusalem,  as  announced,  has  been  trodden  down 
of  the  Gentiles ;  all  nations  have  tramped  through 
her  streets,  overridden  her  people  and  torn  down 
her  walls. 

The  prophets  said  God  would  make  a  full  end 


The  Bible  115 

of  the  nation  which  persecuted  them ;  but  he  would 
not  make  a  full  end  of  them,  he  would  preserve 
and  multiply  them. 

The  promises  have  been  kept. 

Eome  has  become  a  past  tense.  With  thought- 
ful steps  we  pause  amid  her  ruins,  painfully 
locate  the  palace  of  her  kings,  the  arenas  of  her 
pleasure,  the  abodes  of  her  vice ;  on  fallen  column 
or  broken  tablet,  we  read  the  story  of  her  past 
victories,  her  mighty  conquests,  and  standing  be- 
neath a  crumbling  triumphal  arch,  gaze  on  the 
sculptured  figures  of  Jewish  captives  who  once 
followed  in  an  emperor's  triumphal  train,  more 
enduring  to-day  with  their  stony  faces  than  the 
ruined  city  which  lies  prostrate  at  their  feet;  for 
while  Eome  has  passed  away,  the  Jew  still  lives, 
he  has  been  preserved  and  has  multiplied.  The 
Jews  to-day  number  twelve  millions  of  people; 
and  these  represent  but  two  tribes  out  of  the 
twelve ;  so  that  the  two  are  four  times  as  numerous 
as  the  whole  nation  when  it  came  out  of  Egypt 
under  Moses.  Their  vitality  is  phenomenal — it  is 
miraculous — their  multiplication  is  against  all  the 
laws  and  precedents  of  history.  Persecution  and 
trial  have  but  increased  their  fecundity.  Like  the 
burning  bush  ever  burning  but  never  consumed, 
they  continue  to  exist;  and  when  you  draw  nigh 
and  consider  their  strange  story,  out  of  the  midst, 
as  of  old  out  of  the  bush,  the  voice  of  him  who  is 
the  "I  am,  that  I  am"  is  heard  saying — "These 
are  my  disobedient  but  covenant  people,  whom  I 


116     Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

have  sworn  shall  be  to  me  as  the  '  apple  of  mine 
eye'  ";  saying,  "Whosoever  toucheth  them  touch- 
eth  me." 

It  was  foretold  that  in  the  closing  hours  of  this 
age  and  as  a  prelude  to  their  final  restoration,  they 
should  bud  and  blossom  and  fill  the  face  of  the 
whole  world  with  fruit. 

If  to-day  you  seek  a  representative  person  in 
every  department  of  human  genius  and  achieve- 
ment, you  will  find  that  representative  in  a  Jew. 

The  Bible  testifies,  and  testified  it  centuries  ago, 
that  in  the  closing  hours  of  this  age,  the  Jews 
should  turn  their  faces  towards  Palestine  and  ask 
(or  plead)  their  way  to  Zion. 

The  prophecy  has  been,  and  is  being,  fulfilled 
to  the  letter.  The  faces  of  thousands  of  Jews  are 
being  turned  towards  Palestine;  thousands  of 
Jews  are  asking  how  is  it  possible  to  return  to 
Zion.  Zionism  has  passed  from  the  realm  of 
dreams  to  the  solid  ground  of  fact.  Everywhere 
over  the  earth  societies  are  formed  among  the 
Jews  to  emphasize  the  return  to  Zion  and  the  set- 
ting up  of  the  Jewish  State. 

It  was  further  foretold  that  many  should  return 
thither  in  radical  unbelief  and  open  materialism ; 
that  at  the  entering  in  of  the  gates  of  Jerusalem 
land  should  be  bought  and  sold  and  speculation 
become  rife. 

To-day  there  are  more  Jews  in  Palestine  than 
at  any  time  since  the  return  from  Babylon.  Land 
is  bought  and  sold  at  the  gates  of  the  city,  and 


The  Bible  117 

speculation  in  real  estate  values  is  running  high. 
There  is  the  hum  of  expectation  in  the  sacred  city. 
Palestine  is  being  colonized  by  Jews.  The  Turk- 
ish government  has  taken  oil  the  ban,  the  Jew  is 
owned  as  a  citizen  and  may  become  a  representa- 
tive in  its  administration.  The  deserted  cities  are 
being  occupied.  Millions  of  Mulberry  trees  are 
being  planted,  the  desert  and  the  waste  places 
cultivated.  The  lowing  of  cattle  and  the  bleating 
of  sheep  are  heard  once  more.  In  Jerusalem,  the 
wailing  place  of  the  Jews  is  more  crowded  than 
ever.  The  penitential  psalms  are  recited,  tears 
are  shed  and  the  cry  goes  up  with  keener  lamen- 
tation that  the  city,  beautiful  for  situation,  the 
joy  of  the  whole  earth,  has  become  the  prey  of 
the  Gentiles;  that  the  walls  are  broken  down,  the 
holy  places  laid  waste,  "our  holy  and  beautiful 
house,' '  they  cry,  "where  our  fathers  praised 
thee,  is  burned  up  with  fire :  and  all  our  pleasant 
things  are  laid  waste.  Wilt  thou  refrain  thyself 
for  these  things,  0  Lord?  Wilt  thou  hold  thy 
peace,  and  afflict  us  very  sore?"  And  the  prayer 
ascends  with  ever-increasing  supplication  that 
Jehovah  will  again  make  bare  his  arm  in  the  sight 
of  the  Gentiles,  build  up  the  place  of  the  holy 
assemblies,  beautify  Jerusalem  and  establish  his 
people.  Synagogues  are  built  within  the  shadow 
of  the  sacred  rock,  the  one-time  threshing  floor  of 
Oman,  which  David  bought  and  whereon  the  holy 
temple  stood.  The  latter  as  well  as  the  former 
rains  are  falling.    Everywhere  it  is  evident  that 


118     Chkist,  Cheistianity  and  the  Bible 

the  land  is  reviving,  and  the  thought  of  Judah 
as  a  kingdom  and  power  among  nations,  find- 
ing utterance  on  the  lips — both  of  Gentile  and 
Jew. 

And  all  this  activity  and  Zionward  movement 
taking  place  with  the  Jew  in  a  condition  of  spir- 
itual blindness,  unbelief  and  godless  materialism — 
as  foretold.  The  very  leaders  of  Zionism  (some 
of  them)  the  most  outspoken  in  their  repudi- 
ation of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ  as  Messiah  of 
Israel. 

The  Bible  foretold  that  the  Jews  as  a  people 
would  never  receive  the  Gospel:  "As  concerning 
the  gospel  they  are  enemies  for  your  sakes"  (the 
Gentiles).  On  the  other  hand,  it  was  announced 
that  the  Gentiles,  who  despise  the  Jews,  should 
receive  the  Gospel,  accept  a  rejected  and  crucified 
Jew  as  Israel's  king,  and  own  and  acknowledge 
him  as  the  redeemer  and  saviour  provided  for 
themselves. 

This  prophecy  has  been  fulfilled. 

For  nineteen  hundred  years  the  Jew — as  a  Jew 
— has  steadily  rejected  a  crucified  Christ.  Here 
and  there  an  individual,  paying  the  penalty  of 
scorn  and  contumely  from  his  own  people,  has  be- 
lieved the  Gospel  and  owned  the  crucified  and  de- 
spised man  of  Nazareth  as  his  very  Lord  and  God. 
He  has  done  so  according  to  that  election  of  grace 
which  the  Bible  foretells  (an  elect  remnant  is 
seen  through  all  the  ages,  under  one  dispensation 
or  another,  responding  to  the  call  of  God — like 


The  Bible  119 

the  seven  thousand  who  would  not  bow  the  knee 
to  Baal ;  and  belonging  to  that  election  of  grace  the 
believing  Jew  stands  out  marked  and  sealed  of 
God)  but  the  Jew  as  a  nation  with  unbroken  soli- 
darity refuses  to-day  the  only  Jew  who  can  estab- 
lish him  in  the  land  of  his  fathers  and  fulfil  the 
covenant  promises. 

Equally  fulfilled  is  the  other  side  of  the 
prophecy. 

The  Gentiles,  who,  racially  considered,  despise 
the  Jew  and  everything  of  the  Jew,  to-day  own 
and  accept  this  rejected  and  crucified  Jew  of  Cal- 
vary, not  only  as  Israel's  Messiah  and  king,  but 
as  the  redeemer  and  saviour  provided  of  God 
for  Gentiles;  so  that  the  Gentile  world  now 
worships  and  adores  him  as  very  God,  hold- 
ing up  the  cross  of  his  shame  and  death  as  the 
symbol  of  highest  honor  and  most  radiant 
glory. 

The  Bible  has  predicted  the  final  characteristics 
of  the  present  age  in  terms  precise  and  clear. 

By  type,  figure  and  direct  prophecy  it  announces 
that  the  last  form  of  government  among  the 
nations  just  previous  to  the  Coming  of  our  Lord 
Jesus  Christ  will  be  democracy — the  rule  of  the 
people:  "The  government  of  the  people,  by  the 
people,  and  for  the  people.' ' 

That  prophecy  practically  has  been  fulfilled. 

Democracy  is,  nearly,  the  universal  mode 
of  government.  England  in  some  respects  is  more 
democratic  than  the  United  States.    France,  Por- 


120     Cheist,  Cheistianity  and  the  Bible 

tugal  and  Switzerland  are  republics.  Spain,  Italy 
and  Greece  are  constitutional  monarchies ;  that  is 
to  say,  the  people  are  recognized  as  the  ultimate 
authority.  The  Northern  nations,  Norway, 
Sweden,  Denmark,  Holland  and  Belgium,  are  lib- 
eral kingdoms.  The  monarchy  is  simply  a  fashion 
— the  people  are  the  rulers.  Germany  is  a  military 
nation.  The  Kaiser,  speaking  at  times  as  the  war 
lord,  gives  the  impression  that  he  is  absolute 
emperor.  He  is  far  from  it.  The  socialists 
count  their  votes  by  millions,  and  while  the  Ger- 
man people  accept  the  empire,  they  do  so  because 
it  is  the  most  satisfactory  agent  for  their  business 
and  prosperity.  The  German  people  behind  the 
throne  are  the  absolute  power;  and  the  voice  of 
democracy  makes  no  more  radical  utterance  and 
demand  than  in  the  German  kaiser reich.  Ee- 
cently,  in  a  public  interview,  the  Kaiser  is  re- 
ported to  have  said,  he  expected  his  son  to  be  the 
last  emperor  of  Germany,  as  within  fifty  years 
the  whole  world  would  become  democratic.  Aus- 
tria is  still  more  or  less  under  the  influence  of 
Ca3sarism,  but  beneath  the  surface,  the  various 
peoples  and  nationalities  constituting  that  empire 
are  restless,  feverish,  and  full  of  democratic  ideas. 
Turkey  has  been  shaken  by  a  revolt  of  "The 
Young  Turks, ' '  and  the  demand  for  more  popular 
government.  Japan  has  broken  loose  from  the 
customs  and  traditions  of  centuries — her  flag  is 
the  symbol  of  the  rising  sun,  and  indicates  that 
she  is  seeking  to  take  her  place  in  the  new  dawn 


The  Bible  121 

of  popular  sovereignty.  China,  the  oldest  civiliza- 
tion and  the  mightiest  population,  has  become  a 
republic,  her  young  men  returning  from  the  univer- 
sities of  Europe  and  America  having  sown  broad- 
cast the  seed  of  democracy  and  the  claim  of  the 
people.  Russia,  alone,  remains  absolute  in  name, 
but  the  absolute  has  been  shattered  even  there — it 
is  supported  only  by  bayonets  and  drawn  swords. 
Every  now  and  then  a  sullen  sound  is  heard, 
dying  away  to  be  renewed  in  deeper  tones ;  it  is  the 
voice  of  the  people,  in  spite  of  the  knout,  the 
prison  and  Siberian  exile,  calling  for  what  they 
claim  to  be  their  "rights." 

Everywhere  the  evidence  is  manifest  that  the 
prophecy  of  Daniel  announcing  the  rise  of  the 
"clay"  (Daniel's  symbol  of  the  people)  and  the 
warning  of  Isaiah  that  "the  nations  should  rush 
like  the  rushing  of  many  waters,' '  and  "make  a 
noise  like  the  noise  of  the  seas,"  are  being  ful- 
filled. 

After  "Clay,"  or  Democracy,  there  remains 
only  anarchy,  or  power  in  the  hands  of  an  absolute 
ruler.  That  absolute,  world-wide  ruler  is  declared 
by  all  the  prophets  to  be  the  Son  of  God,  and  his 
kingdom  is  symbolized  by  a  stone — a  stone  is  the 
very  opposite  of  clay. 

THE  CLAY  IS  HEEE! 

Centuries  ago  the  Bible  declared  that  in  the 
closing  hours  of  this  age  the  whole  world  would 
be  under  arms,  preparing  for  a  gigantic  and  final 
war :  that  each  nation  would  turn  itself  into  a  vast 


122     Chkist,  Chkistianity  and  the  Bible 

army,  and  that  the  whole  earth  would  become  a 
military  camp  and  field  of  manoeuvre. 

This  prophecy  is  being  fulfilled. 

A  universal  preparation  for  war  is  going  on 
with  maddening  haste.  Nations  are  seeking  to 
outdo  each  other  in  their  colossal  preparation  for 
the  approaching  strife.  Armies  are  no  longer 
mere  levies  or  hired  cohorts,  every  man  in  the 
nation  capable  of  bearing  arms  or  in  any  wise 
doing  military  duty  is  enrolled,  and  must  take 
his  place  as  a  soldier.  During  the  summer  im- 
mense armies  move  out  of  their  barracks  and  play 
seriously  the  game  of  war.  Each  nation  has  its 
field  manoeuvres  and  theme  of  attack  and  defence. 
On  every  side  is  heard  the  tramp  of  marching  feet, 
the  sound  of  bugle  call,  the  rumble  of  artillery,  the 
sharp  word  of  command. 

Nations  are  vying  with  each  other  in  the  en- 
deavor to  cover  the  sea  with  the  swiftest  and  most 
powerful  battleships.  Millions  are  being  put  into 
guns  and  ammunition.  The  money  of  the  people 
is  being  poured  out  like  water  to  obtain  war  ma- 
terial. Forges  and  foundries  are  working  to  turn 
out  the  most  destructive  implements.  The  arsenals 
are  being  gorged  with  cannon,  with  shot  and  shell. 
Enormous  sums  of  money  in  gold  are  stored  away 
in  impregnable  fortresses  that,  as  the  sinew  of 
war,  it  may  be  ready  to  respond  at  a  moment's 
notice.  Never  before  in  the  history  of  the  world 
has  there  been  such  a  spectacle. 

On  land  and  sea  men  are  silently,  ceaselessly 


The  Bible  123 

preparing  for  the  irrepressible  and  impending 
conflict.  Each  nation  feels  its  existence  is  at 
stake ;  not  a  thinking  statesman  who  does  not  feel 
assured  that,  sooner  or  later,  the  clash  will  come. 
All  feel  it  will  be  fierce,  titanic,  f ateful  and  final. 

The  Bible  foretold  the  great  apostasy  as  mani- 
fested in  the  Roman  Catholic  Church,  the  rise  of 
Protestantism,  its  ultimate  breakdown  in  rational- 
ism and  open  infidelity  (that  condition  of  which  it 
should  be  said,  "they  will  not  endure  sound  doc- 
trine). It  foretold  the  rising  again  of  Romanism 
into  the  place  of  power  and  authority  (as  we  see 
it  to-day  in  the  United  States,  where  it  holds  the 
balance  of  political  power  and  is  fast  becoming  a 
social  triumph). 

Who  would  have  had  the  hardihood  to  prophesy 
in  the  hour  when  Protestantism  was  delivering  its 
terrible  blows  against  Romanism,  overturning  the 
tables  of  the  priests,  who  sold  their  infamous 
wares  of  papal  indulgences,  breaking  idols  and 
images  in  the  churches,  and  driving  the  church  of 
the  priesthood,  the  mass  and  auricular  confession 
swiftly  downwards  to  the  waters  of  the  Mediter- 
ranean and,  while  it  was  repudiating  this  apostate 
church  (which  set  up  saints  and  images  in  the 
place  of  the  Son  of  God,  exalted  works  of  merit 
instead  of  the  cleansing  power  of  the  blood)  con- 
tinually cried  aloud  the  glorious  doctrine  of  justi- 
fication by  faith,  and  whose  supreme  watchword 
was — "The  Bible  and  nothing  but  the  Bible"; 
who,  under  such  conditions  as  these,  would  have 


124     Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

had  the  courage  to  proclaim  that  in  the  closing 
hours  of  this  age,  this  aggressive  and  biblical 
Protestantism  should  break  up  by  self-division, 
become  fragmentary,  its  leading  thinkers  and 
teachers  repudiating  the  Bible  as  the  infallible 
Word  of  God  ?  Who  would  have  dared  to  say  that 
Eome  would  come  back,  ascend  into  the  place  of 
authority,  sit  upon  the  throne  of  the  world's  re- 
spect and  receive  its  honors?  Who  would  have 
said  that  this  church  which  has  set  itself  up  above 
the  Bible,  claimed  the  right  to  change  times  and 
seasons  in  defiance  of  a  "thus  saith  the  Lord," 
and  has  burned  men  at  the  stake  for  their  love  and 
devotion  to  this  very  Bible,  should,  at  the  last,  by 
reason  of  the  infidelity  of  Protestantism,  its  recog- 
nition of  divorce  and  its  indifference  to  a  "thus 
saith  the  Lord,"  come  forth  as  the  defender  of 
the  Bible,  the  champion  of  the  home  and  the  guar- 
dian of  the  sacredness  of  marriage,  concentrating 
all  its  thunders  against  the  shame  and  indecency 
of  divorce? 

Yet  these  prophecies  are  written  on  page  after 
page  of  this  book,  and  their  complete  and  amazing 
fulfilment  looks  us  in  the  face. 

What  a  picture  is  painted  for  us  in  the  words 
that  follow: 

"This  know,  also,  that  in  the  last  days  perilous 
times  shall  come.  For  men  shall  be  lovers  of  their 
own  selves,  covetous,  boasters,  proud,  blasphem- 
ers, disobedient  to  parents,  unthankful,  unholy, 
without  natural  affection,  truce  breakers,  false  ac- 


The  Bible  125 

cusers,  incontinent,  fierce,  despisers  of  those  that 
are  good,  traitors,  heady,  high  minded,  lovers  of 
pleasures  more  than  lovers  of  God,  having  a  form 
of  godliness,  but  denying  the  power  thereof.' ' 

' 'The  time  will  come  when  they  will  not  endure 
sound  doctrine :  but  after  their  own  lusts  shall  they 
heap  to  themselves  teachers,  having  itching  ears ; 
and  they  shall  turn  away  their  ears  from  the 
truth,  and  shall  be  turned  to  fables.' ' 

It  is  a  picture  which  finds  its  counterpart  in  the 
Protestantism  of  to-day — a  Protestantism  full  of 
worldliness,  having  a  form  of  godliness,  a  great 
religious  profession,  but  denying  its  only  power 
(the  Holy  Ghost),  repudiating  doctrine  and  listen- 
ing to  every  fable  of  rationalistic  philosophy 
sooner  than  to  the  truth  of  God. 

In  the  letter  to  the  church  at  Thyatira  it  is 
written : 

"That  woman  Jezebel  which  calleth  herself  a 
prophetess  (a  teacher)  to  teach  and  seduce  my 
servants  to  commit  fornication  (fornication  in  the 
book  of  Revelation  signifies  idolatry — image  wor- 
ship and,  also,  union  with  the  principles  and  ways 
of  the  world)  and  to  eat  things  sacrificed  unto 
idols." 

Jezebel  was  the  Pagan  wife  of  Ahab,  king  of 
Israel.  Jezebel  stands  for  the  union  of  Paganism 
and  Judaism.  But  Jezebel  here  represents  a  pro- 
fessed church  of  Christ.  In  Jezebel,  therefore, 
you  have  a  professed  church  of  Christ  in  which 
there  is  a  combination  of  Paganism  and  Judaism. 


126     Chkist,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

This  symbolic  Jezebel  teaches  the  servants  of 
Christ  to  commit  fornication — that  is,  not  only- 
identification  with  the  world,  bnt  idolatry  (image 
worship). 

In  its  full  detail,  then,  we  have  a  professed 
church  of  Christ  in  which  may  be  found  a  mixture 
of  Paganism  and  Judaism.  A  church  where  the 
professed  followers  of  Christ  are  taught  to  wor- 
ship by  means  of  images. 

Could  you  find  a  better,  more  accurate  delinea- 
tion of  the  apostate  Church  of  Eome — a  Church 
which  borrows  the  priesthood  of  Judaism  and  the 
idolatry  and  image  worship  of  Paganism? 

In  this  book  of  the  Eevelation  there  is  still  an- 
other picture. 

In  the  seventeenth  chapter  a  woman  is  seen 
seated  upon  a  scarlet  colored  beast.  She  is  arrayed 
in  purple  and  scarlet.  She  is  decked  with  precious 
stones  and  pearls,  and  in  her  hand  holds  a  golden 
cup  full  of  the  abomination  and  filthiness  of  her 
fornication  (idolatry).  She  is  seen  to  be  drunken 
with  the  blood  of  the  martyrs  of  Jesus.  The 
woman  is,  also,  said  to  be  seated  on  seven  moun- 
tains and  is,  finally,  spoken  of  as  that  great  city 
which  rules  over  the  kings  (nations)  of  the  earth. 

The  woman  is  called  MYSTERY,  BABYLON 
THE  GBEAT,  THE  MOTHEE  OF  HAELOTS 
AND  ABOMINATIONS  OF  THE  EAETH." 

In  the  twenty-fifth  chapter  of  the  book,  the 
BBIDE  OF  THE  LAMB,  the  true  church  of 
Christ,    is    symbolized   by   a    city — THE    NEW 


The  Bible  127 

JERUSALEM.  Babylon  and  Jerusalem  stand 
always  opposed  to  each  other.  Babylon  is  the 
centre  of  Satanic  power  and  testimony — its  name 
signifies  mixture,  confusion.  Jerusalem  is  the 
centre  of  God's  dealings  and  testimony — it  signi- 
fies peace  and  righteousness.  If,  therefore,  the 
city  of  New  Jerusalem  is  a  symbol  of  the  true 
church  of  Christ  and  the  church  of  Christ  is  called 
a  " mystery,' '  then  this  woman  called  Babylon, 
said  to  be  a  city  and  also  called  a  "mys- 
tery," is  a  symbol  of  the  false  church  of  Christ; 
and,  being  a  harlot,  and  the  mother  of  harlots, 
or  churches  like  herself  (and  thus  the  Mother 
Church),  and  harlot  signifying  fornication,  and 
fornication,  idolatry — image  worship — then  a  pro- 
fessed Church  of  Christ,  which  teaches  and  prac- 
tises image  worship. 

The  great  city  ruling  over  the  kings  of  the  earth 
in  John's  day  and  situated  on  seven  mountains, 
or  "mounts,"  is  ROME;  as  the  city  represents 
the  woman  Babylon  who  is  the  symbol  of  the  false 
Church  of  Christ,  then  you  have  a  false  church 
of  Christ  seated  (and  remember,  the  word  is 
"seated")  in  Rome.  A  Church  seated  in  Rome  is 
a  Roman  Church;  and  as  the  city  rules  over  the 
earth,  over  the  world ;  and  a  world-wide  rule  is  a 
universal  rule ;  and  the  word  for  universal,  world- 
wide, is,  also,  "catholic,"  you  have  a  catholic 
church;  and,  seated  in  Rome  (Rome  its  capital 
centre),  THE  ROMAN  CATHOLIC  CHURCH. 

This  Church  is  said  to  be  drunken  with  the  blood 


128    Christ,   Christianity  and  the  Bible 

of  the  martyrs  of  Jesus ;  and  the  pages  of  history 
glued  together  with  the  blood  of  these  same  mar- 
tyrs, and  the  burning,  blistering  record  of  the 
"Holy  Inquisition, ' '  affirm  that  the  astounding 
picture  is  true  in  all  its  crimson  and  scarlet  de- 
tails. 

But  the  striking  feature  in  the  picture,  and  the 
one  that  is  first  presented  to  us,  is  that  the  woman 
(the  Church)  is  carried  by  a  beast.  This  beast  is 
a  symbol  of  government  and  teaches  that  the 
Church  "rules"  over  the  governments  of  the 
world,  is  sustained  by  the  State,  has  attained  to 
"temporal  power."  As  the  picture  occurs  in  the 
third  division,  of  the  book,  and  that  division  relates 
to  things  still  future,  we  have  here  a  distinct 
prophecy  that  this  Apostate  Boman  Church  shall 
again  attain  to  temporal  power,  become  a  State 
Church,  supported  and  carried  officially  by  the 
nations  of  the  earth. 

The  exactitude  with  which  the  picture  has  been 
painted,  and  that,  too,  at  a  time  when  Borne  had 
not  yet  come  into  the  place  of  full-blown  apostasy 
and  power;  the  startling  way  in  which,  step  by 
step,  the  prophetic  outlines  have  been  fulfilled 
even  in  our  day,  are  tremendously  suggestive  con- 
cerning the  possibility  of  its  complete  and  final 
fulfilment;  and  bid  us  ask  most  earnestly — 
whence  came  the  mental  eyesight  which  enabled 
the  writer  of  the  book  to  sketch  out  for  us  cen- 
turies ahead  of  time,  that  which  the  page  of  after 
history  reveals  to  us  as  facts  % 


The  Bible  129 

The  social,  financial,  governmental,  religious 
and  moral  condition  of  the  present  time  have  been 
portrayed  in  the  book  we  call  the  Bible.  The  com- 
ing of  a  special  class  called  "rich"  men  as  a 
particular  characteristic  of  this  age,  the  revolt  of 
labor,  and  its  cry  against  the  wrongs  of  capital, 
were  all  set  forth  in  the  epistle  of  James,  nigh 
two  thousand  years  ago,  with  an  accuracy  that  is 
not  to  be  explained  on  natural  grounds.  So  abso- 
lutely unnatural  is  it,  that  it  is  perfectly  safe  to 
say — these  things  are  not  such  as  a  man  could 
write  if  he  would. 

That  the  book  is  not  to  be  explained  on  natural 
grounds  is  evident  from  the  fact  that  it  is  not  a  CON- 
STRUCTION, but  a  GROWTH;  not  an  ORGANI- 
ZATION, but  an  ORGANISM,  growing  up  from 
Genesis  to  Revelation  like  a  tree  from  root  through 
trunk  and  branch  to  leaf  and  fruit. 

Each  book  of  the  Bible  will  be  found  on  exam- 
ination to  stand  related  organically  to  one  an- 
other; and  that  each  occupies  its  necessary  and 
sequential  order. 

In  Genesis,  you  have  the  beginning  of  things,  the 
germ  and  outline  of  everything  afterwards  re- 
vealed. 

Exodus  gives  the  redemption  by  blood  of  a 
people  foreseen  and  covenanted  in  Genesis,  their 
deliverance  by  the  hand  of  God  from  the  power 
of  the  king  and  the  dangers  of  the  land. 

In  Leviticus,  the  redeemed  people  draw  nigh  to 
God  by  virtue  of  the  blood  of  sacrifice  and  find 


130     Chbist,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

access  to  the  presence  of  God  through  the  inter- 
cession of  a  priest. 

In  Numbers,  this  blood-redeemed  people  are 
seen  on  their  journey  to  the  better  land ;  we  read 
of  their  trials,  their  temptations,  their  un- 
belief, their  backslidings  and  continual  moral 
failure  by  the  way,  and  the  never-failing  grace 
and  love  of  a  covenant-keeping  God  who  leads 
them  in  a  pillar  of  cloud  by  day  and  of  fire  by 
night. 

In  Deuteronomy,  the  people  have  the  way  over 
which  they  have  come,  and  the  dealings  of  God, 
rehearsed  to  them,  and  are  instructed  and  pre- 
pared for  the  land  whither  they  go. 

In  Joshua,  the  second  generation  (which  stands 
always  for  regeneration)  gets  into  the  promised 
land. 

Judges  tells  how,  after  being  blessed  with  all 
covenant  blessings  in  the  covenant  land,  the  people 
fell  into  a  state  where  every  man  did  that  which 
was  right  "in  his  own  eyes.,, 

Ruth,  the  Gentile  woman,  becomes  the  bride  of  a 
Hebrew  Lord;  and  the  covenant  promise  of  God 
concerning  Israel  goes  straightway  down  from  a 
Gentile  mother  and  a  Hebrew  father  towards  the 
throne  which  is  set  up  in  David  and  owned  of  God 
as  the  throne  of  Christ. 

The  books  of  Samuel,  Kings  and  Chronicles, 
take  up  the  story  of  the  kingdom,  and  the  Old  Tes- 
tament leads  us  on  through  symbol,  figure  and 
open  prophecy,  to  a  Coming  Messiah  and  a  glorious 


The  Bible  131 

kingdom  till,  when  we  reach  the  last  verse  in  Mal- 
achi,  we  lean  across  four  centuries  of  prophetic 
silence,  waiting  to  greet  that  promised  Christ  who 
shall  be  born  in  Bethlehem ;  and  who  is  to  be  called 
the  Son  of  the  Highest ;  who  is  to  sit  on  the  throne 
of  his  father  David,  "to  order  it,  and  to  establish 
it  with  judgment  and  with  justice,  from  henceforth 
even  forever.' ' 

We  listen  for  the  angelic  song  and  the  saluta- 
tion to  men  of  good  will;  and  we  are  expecting, 
later  on,  to  see  Zion's  king  riding  up  the  slopes 
to  the  Holy  City  and  all  the  people  coming  forth 
to  cry,  "Hosanna  to  the  Son  of  David,"  and 
"Blessed  be  he  that  cometh  in  the  name  of  the 
Lord." 

When  you  open  the  New  Testament  you  find 
four  books — Matthew,  Mark,  Luke  and  John. 

The  order  of  these  books  is  fixed — it  cannot  be 
changed. 

If  Mark  be  substituted  for  Matthew,  then  the 
New  Testament  begins  without  an  account  of  the 
birth  or  genealogy  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ;  no 
intimation  is  given  that  he  is  born  king  of  the 
Jews,  and  is  the  expected  Messiah. 

If  Luke  be  given  the  place  of  Matthew,  little 
mention  will  be  found  of  the  Jewish  kingdom  of 
heaven ;  and  our  Lord  will  be  seen  with  a  leaning 
towards  the  Gentiles. 

If  the  Gospel  of  John  begin  the  New  Testament 
instead  of  Matthew,  then  we  shall  read  of  him 
who  is  Son  of  God  rather  than  King  of  the  Jews, 


132     Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

and  the  expectation  raised  by  Malachi  will  seem 
unfulfilled. 

But  the  moment  the  order  named  is  followed  all 
is  perfect,  all  is  harmony. 

Matthew  presents  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ  as  the 
Son  of  Abraham  and  Son  of  David;  heir  of  the 
covenant  land,  and  the  covenant  throne,  and  at 
once  links  the  New  Testament  with  the  Old. 

Mark  announces  that  this  King  of  the  Jews 
came  into  the  world  to  be  the  Servant  of  God  and 
a  blessing  in  his  service  to  men. 

Luke,  although  he  announces  our  Lord  Jesus 
Christ  as  King,  sets  him  forth  pre-eminently  as 
The  Man,  going  among  men,  eating  and  drinking 
with  them,  and  speaking  in  such  plain  and  simple 
terms  that  the  ' '  common  people  heard  him  gladly. ' ' 

In  John,  this  Jewish  King,  this  Servant  of  God 
and  men,  this  Man  among  men,  who  received  sin- 
ners and  ate  with  them,  is  revealed  as  the  Mighty 
God,  the  eternal  Word,  the  Holy  One  of  Israel, 
who  came  down  to  visit  his  people,  was  made  flesh 
and  "  tabernacled' '  among  them,  as  of  old  he  dwelt 
in  the  tabernacle  of  the  wilderness  in  the  Shekinal 
glory  above  the  Mercy  Seat  and  between  the  out- 
stretched wings  of  the  golden  Cherubim. 

Take  away  the  book  of  Acts,  and  nothing  can 
be  known  of  the  origin  of  the  church  and  its  apos- 
tolic history.  Without  the  book  of  Acts  the 
epistles  are  wholly  unintelligible  when  they  refer 
to  the  Church. 

Do  without  the  Second  epistle  to  the  Corinthi- 


The  Bible  133 

ans,  and  you  have  no  revelation  of  the  state  of  the 
Christian  dead  either  as  to  their  location  or  con- 
dition. 

Without  the  Second  epistle  to  the  Thessaloni- 
ans  you  cannot  fix  the  identity  of  the  Antichrist. 

Leave  out  the  epistle  to  the  Hebrews  and  there 
is  no  key  to  Leviticus. 

Without  the  book  of  Daniel  it  is  impossible  fully 
to  understand  the  book  of  Revelation. 

No  matter  at  what  period  the  book  of  Revela- 
tion may  have  been  written,  it  can  have  but  one 
place  in  the  Bible,  and  that  the  last.  It  must  have 
this  place  because  it  shows  us  the  f  oreview  of  Gen- 
esis fulfilled:  the  seed  of  the  woman  has  bruised 
the  serpent's  head,  Satan  has  been  bound  and 
Paradise  is  regained. 

The  Old  and  New  Testaments  stand  related  to 
each  other  as  the  two  halves  of  a  perfect  whole. 
In  the  Old  Testament  the  New  is  concealed;  in  the 
New  Testament  the  Old  is  revealed. 

Genesis  finds  its  key  in  the  first  chapter  of 
John's  Gospel,  and  identifies  the  creator  of  heaven 
and  earth  with  him  who  was  made  flesh  and  dwelt 
among  us  as  the  Son  of  God. 

Exodus  is  explained  by  the  First  epistle  to  the 
Corinthians,  in  which  we  learn  that  " Christ' '  is 
the  "Passover  sacrificed  for  us." 

Leviticus  is  expounded  by  the  epistle  to  the 
Hebrews. 

Numbers  has  its  correspondence  in  the  book  of 
Acts. 


134     Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

In  Numbers  you  have  the  experience  of  the  Chil- 
dren of  Israel  in  their  journey  through  the  wilder- 
ness. In  Acts  we  get  the  story  of  the  Church  in  its 
pilgrimage  through  the  world. 

Deuteronomy  is  to  be  read  with  Colossians. 

In  Deuteronomy  the  people  of  Israel  are  being 
prepared  for  an  earthly  inheritance.  In  Colos- 
sians the  Church  is  being  prepared  for  a  heavenly 
inheritance. 

Joshua  stands  over  against  Ephesians. 

In  Joshua  the  redeemed  people  have  to  fight 
with  flesh  and  blood  in  order  to  possess  the  cov- 
enant land.  In  Ephesians  awe  wrestle  not  against 
flesh  and  blood,  but  against  wicked  spirits  in  the 
heavenly  places." 

Judges  may  be  understood  by  reading  the  first 
chapter  of  the  first  epistle,  and  the  twelfth  chapter 
of  the  second  epistle  to  the  Corinthians. 

The  book  of  Ruth  is  illuminated  by  the  third  and 
fifth  chapters  of  the  Ephesians. 

In  Euth  you  have  the  Gentile  bride  of  a  Hebrew 
Lord,  the  kinsman,  redeemer  and  advocate; 
who  presents  his  bride  to  himself  in  the  gate  be- 
fore all  the  assembled  judges. 

In  Ephesians,  the  Gentile  Bride  is  seen  to  be  the 
Church,  the  kinsman,  redeemer  and  advocate, 
our  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  who,  having  loved  the 
Church  and  given  himself  for  it,  will  "present  it 
to  himself  a  glorious  church,  not  having  spot  or 
wrinkle  or  any  such  thing." 

The  books  of  Samuel,  Kings  and  Chronicles, 


The  Bible  135 

may  be  read  with  the  four  Gospels  and  the  book  of 
Revelation. 

In  Samuel,  Kings  and  Chronicles,  you  have  the 
story  of  David,  the  anointed  king,  man  of  sorrows 
and  acquainted  with  grief,  triumphant  warrior, 
exalted  king — Solomon,  prince  of  peace,  ruling 
over  the  established  kingdom  and  the  queen  of 
Sheba  coming  from  the  uttermost  parts  of  the 
earth  to  own  and  celebrate  his  glory. 

In  the  Gospels  we  get  the  story  of  our  Lord 
Jesus  Christ  as  anointed  king  and  man  of  sor- 
rows. In  Eevelation  he  is  seen  coming  forth  at 
the  head  of  the  armies  of  heaven,  a  mighty  war- 
rior, a  triumphant  king  and,  at  the  last,  as  Prince 
of  Peace  ruling  in  splendor"  over  his  established 
kingdom;  while  the  Gentiles,  coming  from  the 
uttermost  parts  of  the  earth  to  Jerusalem,  bow 
the  knee  before  him  and  acknowledge  his  glory. 

Ezra  may  be  read  with  the  latter  half  of  the 
second  chapter  of  the  Ephesians. 

In  Ezra  you  have  the  building  of  the  material 
temple.  In  Ephesus  the  building  of  the  spiritual 
temple. 

Nehemiah  can  be  read  with  the  twenty-first 
chapter  of  the  Revelation. 

Nehemiah  gives  us  Jerusalem  below.  Eevela- 
tion, Jerusalem  above. 

In  the  book  of  Esther  the  name  of  God  is  not 
once  mentioned;  but  it  shows  us  the  unseen  God 
acting  in  his  secret  providence  to  deliver  his  cov- 
enant people,  the  Jews,  from  the  hand  of  the 


136     Chkist,  Chkistianity  and  the  Bible 

Gentile  oppressor,  and  setting  them  in  the  place 
of  authority  and  power  over  the  Gentiles. 

The  eleventh  chapter  of  the  Romans  explains 
the  book  of  Esther. 

In  the  eleventh  chapter  Paul  shows  that  God 
has  not  forgotten  the  people  whom  he  foreknew. 
The  nation  as  such  has  been  set  aside.  It  is  now, 
as  Hosea  says,  Lo  Ammi,  "not  my  people,"  not 
the  people  of  God. 

An  election  according  to  grace  is  going  on 
among  the  Jews.  These  are  being  called  into  the 
Church  and  will  form  a  part  of  the  Body  and 
Bride.  The  Gentiles  have  come  dispensationally 
into  the  place  of  Israel,  and  God  is  sending  his 
Gospel  among  them — calling  out  those  whom  he 
has  foreseen  and  known  among  the  Gentiles.  The 
nation  as  such  would  seem  to  be  cast  aside.  The 
people  are  walking  in  darkness  and  the  name  of 
our  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  their  true  God  and  only 
Saviour,  is  not  owned  among  them ;  but  while  the 
Lord  is  thus  denied  by  them,  he  has  not  forgotten 
them.  His  providences  are  round  about  them  in 
their  preservation  and  multiplication,  and  in  his 
judgment  of  the  nations  which  persecute  them. 
Their  present  condition  nationally  is  temporary. 
Paul  warns  the  Gentiles  that  the  Jews  have  been 
cut  off  and  set  aside  because  of  unbelief.  The 
Gentiles  have  been  brought  in,  and  stand  alone 
by  faith.  It  is  well  for  them  not  to  be  "high- 
minded,"  but  "to  fear";  for  so  surely  as  God 
spared  not  the  nation  and  set  it  aside  because  of 


The  Bible  137 

unbelief,  just  so  surely  will  he  deal  with  the  Gen- 
tiles if  the  Gentiles  fall  into  unbelief. 

The  Gentiles  must  not  be  wise  in  their  own  con- 
ceits. The  blindness  and  the  setting  aside  of 
Israel  will  last  only  till  the  "  fulness  of  the  Gen- 
tiles be  come  in,"  that  is,  till  the  election  among 
them  is  complete;  then  the  Lord  will  take  up 
Israel  as  a  nation  again,  and  precisely  as  he  de- 
livered Mordecai  and  the  Jews  of  Esther's  and 
Ahasuerus'  time  and  made  them  to  be  accepted 
and  feared,  so,  it  is  written,  the  Lord  himself  will 
come  forth  in  behalf  of  his  ancient  people.  "  There 
shall  come  out  of  (unto)  Sion  the  Deliverer,' '  and, 
"so  all  Israel  shall  be  saved." 

The  book  of  Esther  read  in  the  light  of  the 
eleventh  chapter  of  the  Eomans  is  illuminating  as 
to  the  unchanging  faithfulness  of  God  and  his  un- 
ceasing love  for  the  nation  and  people  of  his 
choice. 

Thus  book  after  book  of  the  Bible  may  be 
studied;  and  the  more  they  are  examined  and 
studied,  the  more  manifest  will  be  the  intimate  re- 
lation and  marvellous  correspondence  between  the 
Old  and  the  New  Testaments. 

When  you  realize  the  fact  that  these  Old  and 
New  Testament  books,  so  remarkably  related  and 
inter-explanatory  of  each  other,  have  been  written 
by  different  authors,  without  possibility  of  col- 
lusion or  agreed  plan ;  that  each  part  fits  into  the 
other*;  that  it  cannot  have  one  book  less  or  one 
book  more ;  that  to  take  from  it  would  destroy  the 


138     Chkist,  Cheistianity  and  the  Bible 

completeness,  to  add  would  mar  the  harmony ;  that 
it  is  perfect  in  itself,  having  the  key  of  each  book 
hung  up  at  the  entrance;  that  it  gives  but  never 
borrows  light;  that  it  cannot  be  explained  or  in- 
terpreted outside  of  itself;  that  to  him  who  dili- 
gently searches  it,  it  will  reveal  itself  and  make 
him  wise  both  for  this  world  and  for  that  which  is 
to  come ;  when  all  these  facts  are  faced,  it  ought  to 
be  evident  that  in  the  Bible  we  have  a  living  thing 
and  not  a  mere  handiwork  wrought  by  man ;  that 
man  can  no  more  claim  to  be  the  actual  author  of  it 
than  of  the  mountains  that  are  round  about  Jeru- 
salem or  the  heavens  that  are  high  above  them. 

The  unity  of  a  book  demands  unity  of  objective. 

This  book  has  a  great  objective — a  supreme 
theme. 

That  theme  is  not  Israel — although  two-thirds 
of  the  book  considered  as  a  whole  are  taken  up 
with  the  history  of  that  people.  The  great  theme 
is  not  the  Church  of  Christ — although  the  Church 
in  this  age  is  the  supreme  thing  in  the  sight  of 
God.  The  one  great  theme,  the  one  immense  ob- 
jective of  this  book  towards  which  it  moves 
through  history  and  prophecy,  through  figure  and 
symbol,  through  self-sustained  prose  and  musical 
song — the  one  great  objective  is — 

OUR  LORD  JESUS  CHRIST. 

It  seeks  to  present  him  in  his  person,  his  work, 
his  present  office  and  coming  glories. 

It  sets  him  before  us  as, 

The  Child  born. 


The  Bible  139 

The  Son  given. 
The  Counsellor. 
The  Mighty  God. 
The  Prince  of  Peace. 
The  Everlasting  Father. 
The  Lily  of  the  valleys. 
The  Eose  of  Sharon. 
The  Branch. 

The  Lord  our  Eighteousness. 
The  Lord's  Fellow. 
The  Man  of  God's  Eight  hand. 
He  whose  Goings  forth  have  been  from  of  old, 
from  everlasting. 
The  Burnt  Offering. 
The  Meat  Offering. 
The  Peace  Offering. 
The  Sin  Offering. 
The  Trespass  Offering. 
The  Sum  of  God's  Thoughts. 
The  Man  of  Sorrows  and  acquainted  with  grief. 
Son  of  Abraham. 
Son  of  David. 
Son  of  Mary. 
Son  of  Man. 
God  the  Son. 
King  of  the  Jews. 
King  of  Israel. 
King  of  Kings. 
Lord  of  Lords. 
God  the  Creator. 
God  manifest  in  the  flesh. 


140     Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

The  Second  Man. 

The  Last  Adam. 

The  First  and  the  Last. 

The  Beginning  and  the  Ending. 

The  Way,  the  Truth,  the  Life. 

The  Light  of  the  world. 

The  Bread  of  life. 

The  Good  Shepherd,  who  lays  down  his  life  for 
the  sheep. 

The  Great  Shepherd  who  came  again  from  the 
dead. 

The  Chief  Shepherd,  who  shall  appear  with  his 
flock  in  glory. 

The  Sin-bearer. 

The  Eock. 

Our  Great  God  and  Saviour  Jesus  Christ. 

He  who  is. 

He  who  was. 

He  who  is  to  come. 

He  who  before  Abraham  was,  is,  by  his  own 
announcement,  the  "I  am." 

The  Almighty. 

THIS  SAME  JESUS. 

And  to  these  might  be  added  more  than  five 
hundred  other  names  and  titles,  together  with 
their  cognates,  to  say  nothing  of  the  various  char- 
acteristics assigned  him,  the  things  predicated  of 
him,  until  it  is  found  that  he  is  the  very  warp  and 
woof  of  the  book. 

To  proclaim  him,  exalt  him,  make  him  known, 
set  him  forth  in  his  many  roles,  his  functions,  his 


The  Bible  141 

offices  and  his  covenant  glories,  prophets  recite 
their  visions,  a  Psalmist  sings  his  rarest  songs, 
and  apostles  unfold  their  matchless  doctrines. 

When  you  contemplate  the  fact  of  this  one  ob- 
jective ;  this  tremendous  unity  of  intention  in  the 
book,  you  have  an  overwhelming  demonstration 
of  the  unity  of  its  inspiration.  Whether  the  in- 
spiration be  a  true  or  a  false  one,  it  is  beyond  all 
question  one  inspiration.  A  book  whose  construc- 
tion extends  over  centuries,  written  by  men  sep- 
arated by  time  and  distance  from  each  other,  with 
no  possibility  of  personal  or  mental  relation  to 
each  other — all  writing  to  one  objective — and  that 
to  set  forth  the  Christ  of  God  in  his  varied  rela- 
tions— a  book  with  such  a  unity  of  purpose  demon- 
strates in  the  most  self-evident  fashion  that  the 
writers  were  moved  by  a  common  impulse  and, 
therefore,  a  common  inspiration. 

And  this  unity  of  objective  and  inspiration  co- 
ordinates with  the  wonderful  fact  that  the  book  has 
but  ONE  KEY. 

The  key  which  can  alone  open  this  book  and 
make  every  line  intelligible  from  Genesis  to  Eeve- 
lation  is  Our  Lord  Jesus  Christ. 

Take  Christ  out  of  the  Bible  and  it  is  a  harp 
without  a  player,  a  song  without  a  singer,  a  palace 
with  all  the  doors  locked,  a  labyrinth  with  no 
Ariadne  thread  to  guide. 

Put  Christ  into  the  Bible,  and  the  harp  strings 
will  be  smitten  as  with  a  master's  hand. 

Put  Christ  into  the  Bible,  and  the  voice  of  song 


142     Chkist,  Chkistiantty  and  the  Bible 

is  heard  as  when  a  lark  from  the  midst  of  dew-wet 
grasses  sings,  as  it  soars  aloft  to  greet  the  coming 
dawn. 

Put  Christ  into  the  Bible,  and  all  the  doors  of 
the  palace  are  swung  open  and  you  may  pass  from 
room  to  room,  down  all  the  ivory  galleries  of  the 
King,  beholding  portrait  and  landscape,  vista  of 
beauty  and  heaped-up  treasures  of  truth,  of  in- 
finite love  and  royal  grace. 

Put  Christ  into  the  Bible,  and  you  will  have  a 
scarlet  thread — the  crimson  of  the  blood — that  will 
lead  you  through  all  the  winding  ways  of  redemp- 
tion and  glory. 

Put  Christ  into  Genesis,  into  the  verses  of  the 
first  chapter,  and  it  will  chime  like  silver  bells  in 
harmony  with  the  wondrous  notes  in  the  first 
chapter  of  the  Gospel  of  John,  and  tell  you  that  he 
who  created  the  heavens  and  the  earth  is  he  who 
in  the  beginning  was  the  eternal  Word,  the  voice 
of  the  infinite  silence,  and  who,  creating  for  him- 
self a  human  nature,  and  clad  in  mortal  flesh, 
walked  on  earth  among  the  sons  of  men  as  Jesus 
of  Nazareth. 

Put  Christ  into  the  twenty-second,  the  twenty- 
third  and  the  twenty-fourth  chapters  of  Genesis, 
and  you  will  have  placed  before  you  in  perfect  type 
the  birth  of  Christ,  the  sacrifice,  the  resurrection 
on  the  morning  of  the  third  day,  the  setting  aside 
of  the  Jewish  nation  as  the  first  wife,  the  coming 
of  the  Holy  Spirit  in  the  name  of  the  Father  and 
the  Son  to  find  a  Bride  for  the  Son,  the  calling  out 


The  Bible  143 

of  the  church,  the  endowment  of  the  church  with 
the  gifts  sent  from  the  Father  in  the  name  of  the 
Son,  the  pilgrimage  of  the  church  under  the  guid- 
ance of  the  Holy  Spirit,  the  Second  Coming  of 
Christ,  the  Eapture  and  meeting  of  Christ  and 
the  church  in  the  "field' '  of  the  air,  and  the  mar- 
riage of  the  Son. 

Put  Christ  into  the  dryest  and  dullest  page  of 
the  book  of  Kings  and  Chronicles,  and  it  will 
bloom  with  light  and  glory ;  and  if  you  watch  in 
faith,  you  will  see  the  King's  chariot  go  by,  and 
catch  a  vision  of  the  King  himself  in  his  beauty. 

Put  Christ  into  the  Tabernacle,  and  it  will  cast 
its  treasures  like  a  king's  largess  at  your  feet. 

You  will  see  the  brazen  altar  to  be  the  cross, 
the  brazen  laver,  the  bath  of  regeneration,  even 
the  Word  of  God.  In  the  Holy  Place  the  table  of 
shew  bread  will  speak  of  him  who  once  said,  "I 
am  the  bread  of  life."  The  golden  candlestick 
will  remind  you  that  he  said:  "I  am  the  light  of 
the  world. ' '  The  golden  altar  and  the  priest  with 
his  swinging  censer  of  burning  incense  standing 
thereat  will  proclaim  him  as  the  great  high  priest. 
The  beautiful  veil  of  fine  linen  embroidered  with 
figures  of  the  cherubim  in  blue,  purple  and  scarlet 
color  is  (according  to  a  direct  Scripture)  the  sym- 
bol of  his  flesh,  his  mortal  humanity  while  on 
earth.  Every  board  and  bar,  every  cord  and  pin, 
the  coverings,  the  curtains,  the  blue,  the  purple 
and  the  scarlet  color,  the  golden  vessels  as  well  as 
the  furniture,  each  and  all,  proclaim  him,  illus- 


144     Chbist,  Chkistiantty  and  the  Bible 

trate  and  illuminate  him  in  his  person,  his  work, 
his  present  office  and  coming  glories. 

All  these  are  analogies,  types,  pictures,  and  so 
related  to  Christ  that  he  alone  explains  them;  the 
explanation  is  filled  with  such  perfection  of  har- 
mony in  every  detail,  the  relation  between  them 
and  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ  as  the  Antitype  is  so 
strikingly  self-evident,  that  any  discussion  of  it 
would  be  useless. 

When  you  find  a  key  and  lock  which  fit  each  other, 
you  conclude  they  were  intended  for  each  other. 

In  the  light  of  facts  already  cited,  what  other 
conclusion  can  be  drawn  than  that  Christ  and  the 
Bible  were  intended  for  each  other? 

And  when  you  see  this  Bible  coming  together 
part  by  part,  foretelling  the  Christ  and  explained 
alone  by  him,  what  sane  conclusion  is  possible 
other  than  the  book  which  is  opened  and  explained 
by  him  who  is  not  only  the  Christ  but  the  Personal 
Word  of  God,  must  be,  and  is,  THE  WEITTEN 
WOED  OF  GOD! 

Let  your  mind  dwell  for  a  moment  on  the  style  of 
the  book. 

It  is  so  simple  that  a  child  may  understand  it; 
so  profound,  that  the  mightiest  intellect  cannot  go 
beyond  its  depths.  It  is  so  essentially  rich  that 
it  turns  every  language  into  which  it  is  translated 
into  a  classic.  At  one  moment  it  is  plain  narra- 
tion; at  another,  it  is  all  drama  and  tragedy,  in 
which  cataclysmic  climax  crashes  against  climax. 

It  records  the  birth  of  a  babe,  the  flight  of  an 


The  Bible  145 

angel,  the  death  of  a  king,  the  overthrow  of  an 
empire  or  the  fall  of  a  sparrow.  It  notes  the 
hyssop  that  groweth  out  of  the  wall  and  speaks  of 
the  cedars  of  Lebanon.  It  shows  us  so  pastoral 
a  thing  as  a  man  sitting  at  his  tent  door  in  the 
cool  of  the  day,  and  then  paints  for  us  a  city  in 
heaven  with  jasper  walls,  with  golden  streets,  and 
where  each  several  gate  that  leadeth  into  the  city 
is  one  vast  and  shining  pearl. 

It  is  full  of  outlines — outlines  as  large  and  bare 
as  mountain  peaks,  and  then  it  is  crowded  with 
details  as  minute  as  the  sands  of  the  sea.  There 
are  times  when  clouds  and  darkness  float  across 
its  pages  and  we  hear  from  within  like  unto  the 
voice  of  him  who  inhabiteth  eternity;  in  another 
moment  the  lines  blaze  with  light,  the  revelation 
they  give  is  high  noon — and  all  the  shadows  are 
under  the  feet. 

It  is  terrible  in  its  analysis  and  cold  and  emo- 
tionless in  the  hard  impact  of  its  synthesis.  It 
describes  moments  of  passion  in  passionless 
words,  and  states  infinite  conclusions  without  the 
hint  of  an  emphasis.  It  shows  us  a  man  in  hell 
(hades)  and,  although  it  describes  sufferings  more 
awful  than  mortal  flesh  can  know,  causing  the  soul 
to  shudder  at  the  simple  reading  of  it,  it  takes 
on  no  quickened  pulse,  no  feverish  rush  of  added 
speech. 

In  a  few  colorless  lines  it  recounts  the  creation 
of  the  heavens  and  the  earth.  In  language  utterly 
barren  of  excitement  it  describes  the  most  exciting 


146     Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

and  soul-moving  event  that  can  occupy  the  im- 
agination— that  moment  when  the  heavens  shall  be 
on  fire,  the  elements  melted  with  fervent  heat,  the 
earth  and  the  works  therein  burned  up,  and  a  new 
heaven  and  a  new  earth  brought  into  view. 

It  is  a  book  of  prose  and  yet  a  book  of  sublimest 
poetry. 

The  book  of  Job  is  a  poem  by  the  side  of  which 
the  hexameters  of  Horace,  the  drama  of  Shake- 
speare, the  imagination  of  Milton,  are  not  to  be 
compared. 

In  all  literature  the  book  of  Job  alone  intro- 
duces a  spirit  into  the  scene  and  reports  its  speech 
without  utterly  breaking  down  into  the  disaster 
of  the  commonplace. 

Listen  to  the  account  which  Eliphaz  the  Teman- 
ite  gives.    He  says: 

' '  In  thoughts  from  the  visions  of  the  night,  when 
deep  sleep  falleth  on  men,  Fear  came  upon  me, 
and  trembling  which  made  all  my  bones  to  shake. 

Then  a  spirit  passed  before  my  face;  the  hair 
of  my  flesh  stood  up;  It  stood  still,  but  I  could 
not  discern  the  form  thereof ;  an  image  was  before 
mine  eyes ;  there  was  silence,  and  I  heard  a  voice, 
saying,  "  Shall  mortal  man  be  more  just  than  God? 
Shall  man  be  more  pure  than  his  Maker  V9 

Here  is  the  threshold  of  the  unseen.  Before  he 
sees  or  hears  anything,  the  Temanite  has  the  sense 
of  fear — the  fear  of  something  more  than  human. 
The  unknown  weighs  upon  him  and  presses  him 
down,  all  the  life  and  energy  in  him  are  at  low 


The  Bible  147 

ebb — he  feels  as  though  the  tides  of  life  were  run- 
ning out.  A  spirit  passes  before  his  face.  It  is  like 
a  breath  of  scarcely  moving  air  out  of  the  night. 
The  hair  of  his  flesh  (mark  the  psychological  and 
physiological  fact),  the  hair  of  his  flesh  stood  up. 
It  was  as  if  a  current  of  electricity  had  passed 
through  him.  Then  the  spirit  stands  still.  It  is 
as  though  this  breath  of  air  out  of  the  night  were 
no  longer  moving.  He  cannot  discern  any  form. 
There  is  nothing  fixed  or  stable  enough  for  him 
to  perceive.  An  image  is  before  his  eyes.  He 
makes  no  vulgar  attempt  to  describe  it — it  is  in- 
describable. There  is  a  great  silence ;  then,  as  the 
margin  has  it,  he  heard  a  still  small  voice — not  a 
loud  and  jarring  voice — but  a  voice  low,  soft,  still ; 
and  yet !  the  utterance  of  that  voice !  what  immen- 
sity of  self-conscious  power  what  authority  and 
dignity — the  dignity  of  infinite  integrity:  " Shall 
mortal  man  be  more  just  than  God?  Shall  man  be 
more  pure  than  his  Maker!" 

How  the  night  is  full  of  a  sudden  law  of  pro- 
portion. Mortal  man  and  eternal  God.  You  feel 
the  distance  widening  and  widening  between  them 
there  in  the  stillness  of  the  night.  The  justice  of 
man !  man !  the  unjust — the  law  breaker ;  man,  who 
is  of  yesterday  and  is  gone  to-morrow — mortal 
man,  more  just  than  he  of  whom  it  is  said,  "Justice 
and  judgment  are  the  habitation  of  his  throne.' ' 
Fallen  man,  man  full  of  iniquity,  shall  he  be  more 
pure  than  he  who  made  him ;  he  who  breathed  into 
his  nostrils  the  breath  of  life  and  made  him  a  liv- 


148     Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

ing  soul ;  he  whose  name  is  holiness  and  righteous- 
ness and  very  truth!  As  the  question  lingers  man 
shrivels  and  sinks  into  the  dust,  and  the  whole 
night  is  filled  with  stillness — with  the  stillness  and 
immensity  of  the  all-pervading  and  holy  God. 

Eead  the  thirty-eighth  and  thirty-ninth  chapters. 

They  record  the  highest  reaches  of  human  lan- 
guage, so  great  that  our  own  version  cannot  dim 
their  splendor.  Nothing  ever  written  surpasses 
them,  not  only  in  the  felicity  of  expression,  but 
in  the  sense  of  deity  pervading  them.  Each  suc- 
ceeding verse  sustains  the  other  and,  at  the  last, 
you  feel  that  God,  very  God,  indeed,  has  spoken. 

The  Almighty  answers  the  complaining  Job. 

He  answers  him,  not  out  of  the  midst  of  a  deep, 
unbroken  calm,  but  out  of  the  whirlwind ;  and  yet, 
from  the  centre  of  that  mighty  vortex  of  unlimited 
force  and  energy  and  power,  the  voice  comes  forth 
with  the  calmness  of  one  who  knows  himself 
superior  to  the  whirlwind  and  the  storm. 

"Who  is  this  that  darkeneth  counsel  by  words 
without  knowledge  V9 

This  is  the  abrupt  and  sudden  question.  It  is 
the  fitting  question  of  him  who  knoweth  the  end 
from  the  beginning.  In  the  very  asking  of  it  all 
the  boasted  knowledge,  the  attainment,  the  self- 
consciousness  and  vanity  of  man  fade  away,  and 
man  himself  is  as  nothing — God  alone  remains 
upon  the  vision — all  knowing — all  wise — supreme. 

This  Bible  is  a  book  of  history. 

It  will  spend  page  after  page  in  describing  the 


The  Bible  149 

doings  of  a  rebellious  king,  and  then  compress  the 
story  of  twenty-five  hundred  years  into  a  few 
dozen  lines,  but  will  do  this  in  such  a  way,  by 
means  of  exact  symbols,  that  the  twenty-five  cen- 
turies thus  compressed  will  reveal  a  clearer  outline 
and  fuller  vista  than  thousands  of  ordinary  vol- 
umes could  set  forth  in  detail. 

Mark  the  providence  that  has  guarded  the  book. 

Kings  and  potentates  have  sought  to  destroy  it. 
It  has  been  thrown  into  the  flames.  Volume  after 
volume  has  been  burned.  But  always,  and  at  the 
critical  moment,  some  copy  has  been  preserved — 
here  in  the  cottage  of  a  devoted  peasant  at  the  risk 
of  his  life,  hidden  in  the  crevice  of  a  rock  from 
the  inquisitor's  search,  or  cast  aside  by  a  careless 
hand  and  forgotten  amid  a  pile  of  swept  up  dust 
in  a  neglected  corner  of  some  impregnable  castle ; 
from  whence  it  has  come  forth  to  be  copied  by 
slow  and  painful,  yet  loving,  toil,  passed  from 
house  to  house  secretly  as  a  priceless  treasure, 
then  printed  on  concealed  presses  and  at  last  cast 
forth  as  living  and  fruitful  seed. 

Men  have  denounced  it  and  demonstrated  that 
it  is  false  both  in  history  and  science;  then,  un- 
expectedly, the  stroke  of  a  pick  or  the  turn  of  a 
shovel  uncovers  some  startling  witness  of  its  ex- 
act truth  and  the  excuseless  folly  of  those  who 
deny  it. 

The  fourteenth  chapter  of  Genesis  has  been  set 
aside  by  the  critics  as  historically  worthless.  The 
excavations  in  Babylon  have  brought  to  light  a 


150     Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

tablet  with  the  name  of  Arioch,  the  fourth  king 
mentioned  in  that  chapter,  stamped  upon  it. 

The  statement  in  Exodus  that  Pharaoh  forced 
the  Children  of  Israel  while  building  his  treasure 
cities  to  make  bricks  without  straw,  has  been 
treated  as  a  fable.  The  treasure  chambers  them- 
selves have  been  found,  the  rooms  divided  by  brick 
partitions  eight  to  ten  feet  thick — and  great  quan- 
tities of  these  bricks  made  without  straw. 

Luke  says  that  Sergius  Paulus  was  pro-consul 
of  Cyprus.  The  critics  denied  it  and  proved 
thereby  the  fallibility  of  the  New  Testament. 

The  homely  but  truth-telling  spade,  and  without 
consulting  the  critic,  dug  up  some  coins  in  the 
island  of  Cyprus  itself,  and  on  the  coins  were 
stamped  both  the  image  and  the  name  of  Sergius 
Paulus. 

Luke  declares  that  Lysannius  was  tetrarch  of 
Abilene ;  and  again  the  critics  denied  it  and  more 
than  ever  discounted  Luke  as  an  historian. 

Eenan,  the  plausible  and  analytical  infidel,  read 
the  record  carved  on  the  stones  of  Baalbeck,  and 
announced,  openly,  that  Luke  is  correct. 

From  the  ruins  of  Nineveh  and  Babylon,  Tyre 
and  Sidon;  from  the  trenches  of  Tel  el  Armana; 
by  the  key  words  of  the  Eosetta  stone  and  the 
black  but  speaking  face  of  the  Moabite  stone ;  from 
newly  discovered  papyri  and  parchment,  and  the 
mystic  page  of  cracked  and  crumpled  palimpsest; 
from  the  rocks  of  earth,  the  depths  of  the  sea  and 
the  heights  of  heaven — and  from  the  latest  dis- 


The  Bible  151 

coveries  of  science,  there  arise  amazing  witnesses, 
which  speak  in  tones  that  cannot  be  hushed,  with 
facts  that  cannot  be  denied,  and  bear  testimony 
beyond  all  possibility  of  dispute  to  the  truth  and 
accuracy  of  the  book;  so  much  so,  indeed,  that 
such  an  one  as  Sir  John  Herschell,  the  great 
astronomer,  has  said:  "All  human  discoveries 
seem  to  be  made  only  for  the  purpose  of  confirm- 
ing more  and  more  strongly  the  truths  contained 
in  the  Sacred  Scrip tures." 

Consider  the  vitality  of  the  book. 

In  less  than  ten  years  a  text-book  is  out  of  date, 
a  cyclopedia  worthless,  and  a  library  a  cemetery 
of  dead  books  and  dead  ideas ;  but  this  book  keeps 
living  right  on — keeps  abreast  of  the  times,  has 
a  testimony  for  every  day,  and  every  day  borrows 
its  youth  afresh  as  from  the  womb  of  the  morning. 

Science  has  laughed  it  out  of  court.  Two  hun- 
dred and  fifty  years  ago  Voltaire  said:  "Fifty 
years  from  now  the  world  will  hear  no  more  of  the 
Bible."  Self-elected  scholarship  has  pronounced 
it  out  of  date  and  dead.  Again  and  again  its 
funeral  services  are  held.  Kind  and  condescend- 
ing eulogiums  are  uttered  over  its  past  history  and 
its  good  intent.  With  considerate  hands  it  is 
lowered  into  its  grave.  The  resquiescat  in  pace 
is  solemnly  pronounced  and  lo !  before  the  critical 
mourners  have  returned  to  their  homes  it  has  risen 
from  the  dead,  passed  with  surprising  speed  the 
funeral  coaches,  and  is  found — as  of  yore — in  the. 
busy  centres  of  life,  thundering  against  evil,  re- 


152     Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

vealing  the  secrets  of  the  heart,  offering  consola- 
tion to  the  sorrowing,  hope  to  the  dying,  and  flash- 
ing forth  from  its  quivering,  vital  pages  the  won- 
ders of  coming  glory. 

While  copies  of  the  classics — Virgil,  Zenophon, 
Caesar,  Sophocles,  Pindar  and  Martial — are  to  be 
counted  by  a  few  thousands,  and  are  cast  aside 
by  students  as  soon  as  they  have  graduated,  and 
are  forgotten  in  a  twelvemonth,  this  Bible  goes  on 
printing  every  year  millions  of  copies  in  all  lan- 
guages and  dialects  of  earth;  so  far  from  casting 
it  aside,  when  once  read,  men  take  it  up  and  read 
it  again  and  again,  study  it  through  life,  dig  into 
it  as  for  hid  treasure,  and  make  it  the  pillow  on 
which  to  lay  their  dying  head. 

With  each  succeeding  year  the  demand  for  it 
increases  and  voices  are  continually  crying — give 
us  The  Book. 

It  is  the  supreme  book. 

It  is  the  book  we  need  when  the  fire  of  sin 
gleams  in  our  eye  and  its  poison  burns  in  our 
veins.  It  is  the  book  we  need  when  the  heart  is 
sore,  when  our  soul  is  troubled,  and  when  peace  is 
no  longer  a  guest  in  our  home. 

It  is  the  book  we  need ;  for  from  its  pages  alone 
do  we  behold  the  light  which  shines  from  a 
Saviour's  empty  grave;  from  its  pages  alone  do 
we  receive  assurance  of  the  resurrection  of  the 
dead,  of  immortality  and  the  life  to  come;  and 
from  its  pages  alone  do  we  hear  the  tender  and 
welcoming  words  which  seek  to  greet  us  and  to 


The  Bible  153 

comfort  us  while  we  struggle  here  ofttimes  be- 
neath the  burden's  growing  weight,  those  words  of 
heavenly  music:  "Come  unto  me  all  ye  that 
labor  and  are  heavy  laden  and  I  will  give  you 
rest." 

What  author  on  earth  would  think  his  book  dead 
and  out  of  date  if  year  after  year  the  publication 
of  it  taxed  the  printing  presses  of  the  world? 
What  author  would  deem  his  book  out  of  date 
when  the  voices  of  everywhere  proclaimed  it  the 
book  of  books,  and  multitudes  unnumbered  con- 
fessed that  from  its  pages  alone  they  found  the 
way  of  life  and  peace? 

Such  a  book  is  neither  out  of  date  nor  dead; 
and  its  throbbing  vitality  tells  of  a  life  impulse 
and  inspiration  that  are  not  of  man. 

And,  finally, 

This  book  inspires  men  for  God. 

Every  year  books  on  morality  and  essays  on 
conduct  are  written  and  published.  They  get  as 
far  as  a  first  edition  and  are  never  heard  of  again ; 
but  this  book,  which  binds  all  its  parts  about  the 
person,  the  work,  the  office  and  the  glories  of 
Christ,  changes  the  life,  the  character,  the  time 
and  the  eternity  of  men. 

Place  this  book  in  the  midst  of  the  vilest  and 
most  abandoned  community  of  desperate  and 
devilish  men  and,  sooner  or  later,  you  will  hear  a 
cry  coming  from  the  depths  of  sin  and  shame,  bit- 
ter cries  of  repentance  and  yearnings  after  God ; 
and  by  and  by  that  community  will  be  trans- 


154     Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

formed,  men  will  no  longer  be  demon  filled,  but 
possessed  with  a  spirit  of  truth  and  love;  and  God 
will  be  found  to  reign  and  rule  in  the  midst. 

Whatever  there  is  of  sweetness  and  truth  and 
righteousness  in  the  world  to-day;  whatever  there 
is  that  gives  hope  and  comfort  on  earth  and  holds 
men  back  from  very  madness  and  despair,  is  due 
directly  and  indirectly  to  this  book. 

Take  up  a  map  and  find  the  lands  where  sin  and 
vice  skulk  in  the  darkness ;  where  virtue  is  honored 
and  purity  enthroned;  go  mark  on  the  map  the 
lands  where  the  men  are  the  most  manly  and  the 
women  the  most  womanly,  and  you  will  find  it  in 
those  lands  where  the  Bible  is  exalted,  not  as  the 
word  of  man,  but,  in  deed  and  truth,  as  the  Word 
of  God. 

Find  the  men  and  women  who  know  most  of 
God,  who  have  the  deepest  consciousness  of  him  in 
the  soul,  and  who  walk  every  day  with  the  assur- 
ance of  his  real  presence — to  whom  the  unseen  be- 
comes from  hour  to  hour  the  thing  that  is  alone 
real — and  who  live  as  kings  above  their  prostrate 
passions — and  they  will  be  those  who  make  this 
book  the  supreme  authority  in  their  daily  lives; 
who  hear  it  when  it  speaks  to  them  as  the  very 
voice  of  God. 

A  book  which  thus  inspires  men  for  God  is,  in- 
deed, a  book  which,  by  every  law  of  logic,  must 
have  been  inspired  by  God. 

From  the  evidence  cited  two  things  are  appar- 
ent: 


The  Bible  155 

1.  The  Bible  is  not  such  a  book  as  a  man  would 
write  if  be  could. 

2.  The  Bible  is  not  such  a  book  as  a  man  could 
write  if  he  would. 

By  these  conclusions,  therefore,  the  Bible  is 
shown  to  be  not  of  man. 

As  the  book  is  thus  shown  to  be  not  of  man — 
either  by  inclination  or  ability;  and  as  from  the 
beginning  to  the  end  its  object  is  to  glorify  the 
unseen  God  in  the  revelation  of  his  incarnate  Son, 
then  this  book  is  of  God;  and  being  the  utterance 
of  his  mind  and  will,  is  his  Word;  so  that  the 
statement  of  the  apostle  concerning  it  is  justified. 
It  is  to  be  received  as  he  says:  "Not  as  the  word 
of  man,  but  as  it  is  in  truth,  THE  WOED  OF 
GOD." 

To  him  who  so  approaches  it — who  puts  his 
shoes  from  off  his  feet  as  on  holy  ground,  and  with 
the  silence  of  expectant  faith  listens  and  looks,  it 
will  disclose  itself,  speak  to  him,  and  so  lay  hold 
of  the  inner  recesses  of  the  heart  that  he  shall 
know  he  has  been  face  to  face  with  God,  has  had 
glimpses  of  the  delectable  mountains  and  the  city 
foursquare  that  lies  beyond;  from  henceforth  he 
shall  walk,  not  as  one  in  a  vain  show  or  in  the 
mixing  of  darkness  and  light,  but  where  the  night 
shineth  as  the  day;  where  the  road  is  no  longer 
paved  with  the  stumbling  stones  of  doubt,  nor  the 
signboards  filled  with  a  guess,  but  where  the  way 
leadeth  on  and  up — shining  more  and  more  bright 
unto  the  perfect  day. 


156     Chkist,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

Take  up  this  book,  0  friend.  Do  not  read  it 
with  a  hurried  glance.  Let  thine  eyes  rest  a  while 
upon  some  single  word,  and  if  thou  art  patient, 
it  will  bud  and  blossom  and  bloom  and  grow  unto 
thee  as  a  tree  of  life;  and  the  leaves  shall  be  as 
medicine  for  the  healing  of  thy  hurt.  Take  it  into 
thy  mouth  and  learn  a  lesson  from  the  meadow 
kine  who  chew  the  tender  grasses,  and  turn  them 
over,  and  chew  them  again,  till  they  have  extracted 
sweetness  and  life  therefrom.  Chew  the  words  of 
this  book  over  and  over  again  (it  is  impossible 
to  do  so  with  any  other  book),  meditate  upon  the 
words  (to  meditate,  to  reflect,  are  highest  func- 
tions), mediate  upon  their  meaning — upon  their  di- 
rect and  cognate  meanings ;  let  the  thoughts  they 
suggest  find  full  and  free  reaction  in  thy  soul,  and 
from  some  simple  word  or  phrase  thou  shalt  draw 
the  sweetness  of  divine  love,  and  more  and  more 
the  consciousness  that  thou  hast  received  into 
thine  innermost  being  very  spirit  and  very  life. 

Eead  it  on  bended  knee.  Take  up  the  words  and 
breathe  on  them  with  the  warm  breath  of  sincere 
desire  to  know  their  intent,  and  music  will  come 
forth  as  from  the  fabled  horn  of  old — music  that 
shall  have  in  it  all  the  hallelujahs  and  hosannas 
of  the  heavenly  host. 

If  you  will  take  this  book  to  your  heart,  you  will 
find  it  bread  such  as  kings'  ovens  never  baked, 
water  more  crystal  than  that  which  bursts  from 
mountain  springs,  wine  the  like  of  which  was 
never  pressed  from  purple  grapes,  meat  which 


The  Bible  157 

cattle  on  a  thousand  hills  never  furnished,  and 
fruit  no  man  ever  gathered  in  royal  gardens — the 
fruit  of  the  Spirit.  You  will  find  it  a  lamp  unto 
your  feet  and  a  light  unto  your  path,  a  hammer 
for  breaking  the  flinty  rocks  by  the  way,  a  fire 
that  will  burn  out  the  stain  of  sin,  and  warm  be- 
numbed fingers  for  quickened  service  in  His  Name. 

Give  it  the  first  place  in  your  life.  You  will 
want  to  hear  from  it  as  the  last  thing  when  you 
go  hence.  The  words  of  loved  ones  will  be  sweet 
in  your  ear  as  you  leave  these  mortal  shores  (if 
our  Lord  Jesus  Christ  should  not  hasten  his 
coming,  you  must  go),  but  you  will  want  to  hear 
its  utterance  above  all  the  tones,  even  of  those  you 
love,  speaking  the  final  word  of  hope  and  cheer 
to  you. 

Be  very  patient  with  it.  It  has  great  things  to 
say  to  you — and  you  will  not  always  be  fit  to  hear 
them.  You  will  not  always — at  the  first — be  able 
to  understand  them ;  but  if  you  do  not  understand 
to-day,  to-morrow,  or  other  morrows  after  that,  it 
will  speak  to  you  and  you  shall  fully  know.  Per- 
haps it  will  wait  till  the  unshed  tears  are  in  your 
heart,  and  the  moan  the  common  ear  has  never 
heard — then  it  will  speak — and  the  words  will  fall 
into  the  sore  place  of  the  soul,  as  though  angel  lips 
had  touched  it ;  it  will  wait,  perhaps,  till  the  storm 
is  high,  and  your  frail  craft  (life's  poor,  frail 
craft)  is  tossed  as  though  it  would  go  down  in  the 
whelming  waters  (and  the  shore  so  far  away),  and 
then  it  will  speak  and  say,  " Peace — be  still,"  and 


158     Christ,  Christianity  and  the  Bible 

in  that  driven  life  of  yours  shall  be  a  great  and 
holy  calm. 

Do  not  attempt  to  cross-question  it  as  though 
you  hesitated  to  believe  all  it  said.  To  accept 
some  parts  and  reject  others  will  be  fatal  to  you. 
God  does  not  reveal  himself  to  those  who  doubt 
him.  He  that  cometh  to  God  must  believe  that  he 
is,  and  that  he  is  the  rewarder  of  all  them  that 
diligently  seek  him.  So  must  you  approach  this 
book — with  reverence  and  submissive  faith;  for 
this  book,  O  friend !  is  not  the  word  of  man,  but  in 
very  truth— THE  WOBD  OF  GOD. 


DATE  DUE 

&WWm.B^awt,.-.'-. 

it 

GAYLORD 

PRINTED  IN  U    S    A. 

